


blood // water

by goddcoward



Series: talk to me pretty (here kitty, kitty) [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Body Horror, Depression, Eye Trauma, F/F, F/M, FOR LIKE ACTUAL PLOT, Forced Labor, HELLO I ACTUALLY MADE SOME PLANNING, Healthy Relationships, Imprisonment, M/M, Minor Character Death, Miscarriage, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, The Fic Will Go On. probably despite me but. it will, Torture, Unethical Experimentation, and avacaodiis, dont worry folks, gay happiness is mandatory in my household, im sitting here staring at my outline and crying lmao i just have bitch who can’t write disorder, its hit or miss whether the italics etc will survive the copy/paste. i guess i never hit, i’m just gonna pepper these in here, kin drama lmao .., madara is a dumbass. this is law, nonconsensual medical procedures, ohhh ell mow time for an update, starring matatabi as clifford the big red dog, we have baananiis, welcome to my twisted mind!, yeahhhh lmao were getting to the good parts.....Soone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-21
Updated: 2019-02-17
Packaged: 2019-10-13 16:26:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 16
Words: 80,513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17491346
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goddcoward/pseuds/goddcoward
Summary: The wars are still raging when the shinobi take collective notice of the bijuu and what that kind of power could give to any Clan Head crazy enough to tame one. Uzumaki Mito is still living on her island in the eastern seas with only a years-old, long-ignored arranged engagement to the God of Shinobi to draw her interest away from it, and without her wealth of sealing knowledge and her invention of the Byakugō - a masterpiece of fūinjutsu that does not yet exist - there is no way to bring the Tailed Beasts and their ancient chakric devastation to heel under human command.That does not stop the Shogun from trying.Senju Tobirama gains a new feline friend (?) with a rather nasty attitude, the Nibi no Bakeneko gains a small and squishy prison, and Zetsu is still an absolute rat bastard, but this time people notice.





	1. we'll never get free

**Author's Note:**

> i'm back on my bullshit except this time i'm frustrated enough w lack of content to not only make some myself but share it so. good luck lmao
> 
> i have sad bitch disorder and i'm really struggling w school rn and also who knows when the hyperfixation stick will smack me again and take me somewhere else lmao....just this is probably never gonna have any kind of update schedule so F for that
> 
> also shoutout to kiki the cat. she is literally just a cat but she's a sweetheart and a complete goblin criminal and i love her.....i hope you never read this but if you do then thanks emi for letting me assign yr pet matatabi kin cause you know we're going to hell for doing that to her
> 
> title from grandson's blood // water cause that's a big ass emo mood and also an appropriate founders' era anthem

UZUMAKI CLAN COMPOUNDS, UZUSHIO, WARRING CLANS ERA

Years before fūinjutsu ever gains an S-Rank classification to begin with – the only caliber of seal remotely able to contain a Tailed Beast – Uzumaki Akira refuses to lend her services to the Shogun and his mercenaries.

It is not the first time Uzushio has been approached by outsiders seeking to commission seals for unsavory purposes, but it is the most galling offense; to even imagine that the wars could possibly be driven by the forces of nature like the bijuu is too much, even for the Uzumaki matriarch and her certainty in the stability of her island.

The Shogun’s representatives – two brothers from Kumo who she recognizes on sight and a host of their hand-picked shinobi, and it’s worrying that a civilian leader would shell out the ryō to hire Kinkaku and Ginkaku, regardless of context – are displeased to hear it. They have to be at least seven feet tall, and the both of them are laden with weapons and artifacts and other such trinkets imbued with such potent chakra that the air itself shimmers with it, but Akira is not moved. She has driven hurricanes from Uzushio with her bare hands before and she will not be shaken by a pair of brats with some bigger-than-average swords and bitter scowls, no matter how much they threaten her.

The Handmaidens are restless, muscles shifting beneath the silks of their yukatas. Today was not a day they had been expecting visitors, and they’re dressed down in civilian clothes, but they haven’t changed and they won't until they're alone with their princess. They’re hardened kunoichi and are undoubtedly already armed, and the mainlanders seem to have dismissed them as untrained women, and anyone foolish enough to do that deserves what bloody death they may come to.

“This is not a choice, Hime,” growls Kinkaku, straightening in an attempt to make himself taller, like that will be successful. “You are commanded by the Shogun to devise a seal to contain a bijuu and turn it over to us along with a fūinjutsu master of your choosing to recreate it once a suitable host has been found. You will be rewarded handsomely, won’t she, Ginkaku?”

The man hums, oddly melodic coming from someone built like a bear and roughly as approachable.

“Yes, Kinkaku, it was made clear to us that she will. Akira-hime, your people’s skill with the sealing arts is unparalleled, and his Highness is determined that this will happen, one way or another; capturing and containing the Tailed Beasts would unquestionably be much quicker and safer with your jutsus and assistance.”

They then have the gall to look at each other and nod in sync before turning back to her with expectant eyes, like she hasn’t noticed they’re the very same shinobi who thought to steal for themselves the power of the Nine-Tails, like it is an inevibility that such ancient, powerful creatures can be brought to heel, like that isn’t the surest damn way to summon the wrath of Kami upon humanity for the _hubris_ —

Akira takes a deep breath, and then another, and after a few more she is composed. Her Handmaidens do not deserve to witness the full brunt of her temper, not when nobody’s died yet; she is a Clan Head and a princess and a goddamn professional and she will not lose her head because some royal from the continent has decided he’s the second coming of the Sage.

Her soulmark burns in its emptiness. Ryōta died trying to calm the endless storms stirred up by the Eight-Tails when some fishermen unwittingly encroached on a stretch of ocean it had claimed for itself, and Akira is without husband, now, and has been for years, since Mito was barely months old. The pain does not stop – it has never stopped, really, and she knows in the deepest parts of herself that she would do whatever she must to prevent anyone else from knowing that same pain for no reason better than the Shogun’s pride.

“Ginkaku-sama, Kinkaku-sama,” and they look surprised to hear her addressing them with respect, and she can’t decide if that’s funny or insulting- “I am _well aware_ of the depth of Uzushio’s knowledge and the lack of that knowledge anywhere else, which is why I can tell you that you will not find what you are looking for off this island, and why you must realize the gravity of what you have requested of me. The bijuu are not samurai or shinobi or any other kind of troop that can be paid for and sent out to war to follow orders and lay siege to enemy compounds. They are centuries old. They are unimaginably powerful. They are _not human_ , and as they are they pose no threat to the safety and wellbeing of any community under the Shogun’s jurisdiction or even any outside of it. _Safe_ is not a word you should feel comfortable using in conjunction with sealing them away and, presumably, into people who can be manipulated to the liking of some higher power. It is not a word you should be using around them in general, because trifling with the Tailed Beasts is the quickest possible way to instigate a higher form of war that the Elemental Countries would not survive – not with the power of the Sage turned against them because your lords felt like they had some kind of right to it.” Akira pauses for breath and shoves down the glaring unease she feels at the growing storminess on her visitors’ faces. “I will not accept the Shogun’s offer nor will I grant any inhabitant of Uzushio permission to do the same. It is reckless and dangerous and ill-advised and you would do well to inform your employer of this. I-”

Ginkaku looks like he’s about to interrupt, or maybe start slinging around hand signs while they’re still indoors, so she holds up a hand and looses enough killing intent to make the brothers freeze in their places and cause the candle flames to sputter and waver.

Akira fixes them all with her practiced Clan Head Glare. Her Handmaidens are alert, but they do not yet reach for their weapons; she is not finished speaking.

“I will under no circumstances associate myself with this lunacy. Your welcome on Uzushio was never actually given and my patience with your stubbornness has run short. Leave, now, and push whatever thoughts you may have of dominion over the bijuu out of your mind and pray your Shogun has the wisdom to do the same.” Her tone is glacial and brooks no argument, and the Gold and Silver brothers do seem to be competent enough to recognize a lost cause when they see one. They bow at her stiffly (still in perfect sync – are they actually a hivemind?) and sweep out of the room, trailed by Chiyoko.

The tension in the room only relaxes when Chiyoko’s crocodile summons reports back ten minutes later with news that the visitors have left and that its mistress has remained on the beaches to ensure they don’t return – that’s right, Chiyoko is a sensor, she’ll be able to tell whether or not they’re gone for good – and the rigidity bleeds out of everyone present.

“Holy shit,” says Toro, head cradled in her hands like she’s fighting a migraine, or maybe convincing herself that life isn’t pointless and that she has reason to go on. “Holy _shit_ is this really happening.”

Monaka collapses into the side of Akira’s desk, laughing softly and shaking her head. “They’re… they can’t possibly be serious, can they? I mean, we’ve been the best of the best with seals since seals have existed and I don’t know if it’s even possible to seal a Beast into a person without killing one or both of them or, I dunno, accidentally destroying the consciousness of a fucking bijuu.”

Akira is leaned back in her chair, loosing her red hair from its painfully tight ceremonial updo. She sets her kanzashi on the desk and rifles through the drawers for- ah, there it is.

Minutes later shōchu has been poured, compensation for having to have sat through that and listen to the words being said, and the tense atmosphere that the Lightning nin brought with them is finally unraveling when little Mito storms in, flinging closed the shoji doors behind her and shadowed by an apologetic Chiyoko.

Akira smiles at the sight of her daughter, scarlet hair whipped into a briny mess by the ocean breeze and tiny face flushed with the powerful emotions only young children can seem to feel. Mito is a darling, fierce like all of her foremothers and not yet grown into the grace she’ll learn when she becomes Clan Head, and even though she’s only seven she’s already mastered the basics of fūinjutsu theory and has proved to be something of a prodigy with combining them in unconventional ways to invent brilliant new techniques.

“MOTHER,” says Mito, all youthful determination and precocious honesty, “I MET A GIRL.”

Monaka and Toro seem to find this both absolutely precious and fucking hilarious, given that they break into slurring coos and whoops and apparently seem to be attempting to give Akira’s seven-year-old daughter The Talk, which. She’ll have to have a discussion with her Handmaidens about propriety and how Mito is literally a child and how they really should stop drinking on duty, despite the fact that Akira herself was the one to break out her secret stash of Politics alcohol for communal use.

Chiyoko shakes her head at Akira’s questioning look and presses one hand down to smooth Mito’s red flyaway bangs away from her face.

“Apparently,” she says, tired even though it’s barely ten in the morning, “the esteemed Gold and Silver brothers thought it wise to bring a child with them to a meeting where they intended to extort us into cooperation. And then thought it alright if they just…left the child behind when we said no like normal people with functioning brains.”

“YES,” pipes up Mito, who really must be very enthused about the prospect of a new friend if she hasn’t realized she’s yelling, “SHE IS MY SOULMATE AND HER NAME IS KYASHI AND WE ARE SOULMATES. ALSO HER HAIR IS NOT RED.” The girl pauses at this, like that’s the most important thing she just said, and continues, thankfully at a lower volume: “It’s white but she’s my soulmate and kind of unconscious on the beach right now and there’s only a summons watching her but it might eat her and if it does I’ll be mad, so you have to let us keep her and she can live with us and she’s my _soulmate_ -” emphasized with all the subtlety of an exploding tag to the face- “so if I want to have sleepovers with her every day and eat ramen with her and help her dye her hair red it would be _very bad_ if you tried to stop me.” Finished with her tirade, Mito sniffs delicately at how successfully she’s pole-axed everyone in the room and nods at her mother and her guards before throwing open the doors again – _really_ , the child knows they’re made of paper and should be more gentle with them – and zooming away, presumably towards the beach.

There is silence. Akira pours herself some more shōchu and does not bother to smooth the folds in her kimono. Chiyoko takes a seat and makes motions at the bottle, and no one stops her, mostly because the other two women in the room seem to be trying not to cry-laugh all over their teammate and Clan Head.

It is a failed effort, and Chiyoko buries her face in the bottle to the raucous crowing of Monaka and Toro as they gesture and howl and sing off-key love songs and switch around the pronouns.

Akira tries to take her calming breaths, a method that usually works when she’s forced to endure Grievous Quantities Of Bullshit, but it fails her, so she just slides ungracefully to the floor and wonders what the hell just happened. It wasn’t even a long meeting. It was barely a meeting at all.

She groans at the sound of her guards chattering excitedly above her and tries not to think about what disaster is undoubtedly coming next, and how she’ll have to contact that ass Senju Butsuma and let him know that his son will either have to give up on a marriage alliance or settle for being Mito’s second wife.

Akira kind of hopes, now, that the Shogun manages to succeed in the impossible (apologizing half-heartedly to the gods for her offense; she is only human, after all, and is owed her instances of hyperbole), if only because an impending apocalypse will probably keep her attendants from making crude comments about her daughter’s future marriage.

 

ON THE BANKS OF THE NAKANO RIVER, HI NO KUNI, WARRING CLANS ERA

Senju Hashirama is ten years old and one thousand percent certain that whatever emotion he’s feeling right now has to be the strongest, most overwhelming emotion anybody has felt ever, and that it’s so _unfair_ that he hasn’t got a soulmate yet, even though the (very small) logical side of his brain that sounds like Tobirama reminds him _again_ that he shouldn’t expect them to show up until he’s at least into puberty.

Hashirama has prostrated himself on the stony river shore after waking up from an unplanned nap and all he can think about right now about is just how far away that is and how old he’ll be when he finally meets them, and will he even be the same person at fourteen or nineteen or 24 that he is now?

Definitely not!

There are rocks poking through his clothes, he thinks gloomily, probably as divine encouragement to make him sit up and go searching. Hashirama is obviously far too busy sulking to listen to any dumb divine encouragement, however, which proves to be a mistake when a stone skips out of nowhere to nail him in the head.

It hurts a lot.

“That hurts, a lot!” he yelps, finally sitting up, and it’s at an odd angle but he recognizes the reflection of his Secret Best Friend Madara, all wavy from the ripples and glowering meanly, which must be a trick of the light since he’s done nothing to deserve being glowered meanly at.

Hashirama looks up and nearly wilts back down again because the real Madara is indeed glowering meanly for _no reason_ , which isn’t the way best friends should act when another best friend is clearly in deep emotional distress, as is obviously the case here. Hashirama is generous enough to realize that Madara with his spiky hair and many angry scowls may not know this – he’ll be helpful, then, and remind him.

“Hey. Hey Madaaaaara, Mads, hey. Hey! Heee _aaaayyyyy_ —”

Madara just frowns deeper at Hashirama’s friendly attempt to catch his attention and throws another stone at him for good measure. It catches his knee at just the wrong angle and leaves him wailing dramatically and shoving up his pants leg to examine what will no doubt be a horribly traumatic bruise. It hasn’t appeared yet, which is a relief because Tōka will laugh at him if she sees his knee painted black and blue but horrible because Tobirama will sniff and turn away when his beloved anija asks for his help. Tobes is so much better with chakra control, though, and Hashirama isn’t good enough with iryō-jutsu to not just blow his whole leg up accidentally—

Another rock, sailing barely a centimeter past his face, and oh, yeah, he was gonna remind Madara how to be a good best friend in times of strife.

“What are you doing,” the other boy hisses, and Hashirama imagines that his spiky black hair bristles just like a cat’s when he does that, and manfully suppresses a giggle at the thought. “Did you just try to get my attention when you already had it only to forget I was here? Is the inside of your head as tragic as the outside?”

“Nooooooo,” says Hashirama, graciously ignoring the insult – really, he gets teased enough by Tōka and Tobes at home, it’s so unfair that he comes to the river just to get yelled at more – “I was just thinking! And I thought that since I’m so, so upset right now-” “You are literally fine. There’s nothing wrong with you that wasn’t already wrong when you were born-” “and because you’re so mean, Madara, who taught you this meanness! I was thinking that since we’re best friends I’d remind you that the proper best friend duty when things like this happen is to run over to my side of the river and heal my knee that you _broke_ —” “Listening to you is making me just as stupid, you should stop talking or my brothers will notice just how dumb I’ve become—” “and then have a nice friendly chat while you lose at skipping stones! That sounds like an afternoon that would cheer me right up!”

Despite the numerous unwelcome interruptions, Hashirama chooses to be the bigger man, so he beams happily at Madara with the smile that Tobes says makes his eyes hurt and pats the rough ground beside him. Madara eyes it distrustfully – hurtful! When has Hashirama _ever_ done _anything_ to _anyone_ with the intent to trick them – but picks up the katana he’d brought with him and walks out onto the surface of the water, only a little wobbly this time. It’s an improvement over last week, when he’d been very solid but missed a step and gone flailing into the shallows and gotten a carp nibbling at his hair.

Hashirama smiles again, softer this time. He and Madara spend a long while just making dumb jokes and skipping stones and sparring, with Hashirama putting up a decent show against an actual sword with his mighty stick of driftwood, and he’s happy, just lazing around with his friend in the late afternoon sunlight.

The sky has bled from sapphire blue to yellow and orange by the time it’s brought up again.

“So,” Madara says, grumpiness thoroughly quashed by several victories over his friend, “what were you crying about when I got here? You didn’t even notice me until I brained you with a rock and you seemed way more out of it than usual. Like, really weird, weird for _you_ , which is a real achievement since you're so weird even just being normal.”

Hashirama slumps over, morosely beginning to pluck at the mud-stains on his pinstripes, unhappily reminded of the messenger osprey and what news it had brought his father from the island of Uzushio. He wrings his wrists a couple times and attempts a joke that falls flat; Madara’s staring at him, oddly intent and with such piercing dark eyes, and he deflates and explains his whole Situation.

 

SENJU CLAN MAIN HOUSE, HI NO KUNI, WARRING CLANS ERA

Earlier that day, Hashirama had gotten up with the sun as per usual and spent a delightful morning running away from Tobirama, who had not been pleased to be roused at dawn just to get his face dunked in the koi pond, chilly as it was at this point in spring. He’d waved his usual cheerful good morning to his cousins and aunties and uncles and countless others of varying blood relation; it really was a beautiful day, but not otherwise unremarkable, until Butsuma stormed the dining hall with a fishhawk on his arm and his permanent scowl fixed in place. Which, in hindsight, wasn't really unremarkable either; for someone who is both a Clan heir and a shinobi who goes on missions and into battle, Hashirama's life is awfully boring.

“Boy,” he barks, successfully getting the attention of all two boys sitting at the table and eating breakfast. Tobirama refuses to startle and straightens up in his chair, ever at attention, but Hashirama drops his chopsticks and gets rice on his sleeve, which sucks, but not as much as the fierce glare he’s receiving from his father.

“Boy,” Butsuma repeats, shaking the scroll he’s holding at his eldest son. “Come with me. There’s been a message from the Uzumaki.”

Hashirama stops fluttering over his meal at that point, jolting upright at the memory that the Uzumaki were a Clan from Whirlpool, and that he’s been tentatively engaged to their youngest princess as part of an alliance. He’s never met her and has shamefully forgotten her name, but he does know that she might have red hair, which he learned after Tōka came back from visiting there and told him that most of the Uzumaki do.

He wonders what’s happened, and if his father is actually upset or if it’s just the usual stone face he’s taken to showing everyone since Itama died a couple months ago.

Hashirama is led into Butsuma’s office and seated firmly on the floor, with no answers yet and a half-full stomach; he never got to finish his food.

Butsuma tosses the scroll into his lap and shoves himself into the big chair behind his desk. He glares down at Hashirama for a couple seconds before he gets it and opens up the scroll, heroically puzzling his way through the calligraphic kanji the message was written in, which looks more like seal-script than actual language.

There’s only a paragraph or so of pleasantries before he reaches the important part and stops.

Hashirama has a soulmate, of course; everyone does, even if it’s not a romantic bond, and even if he hasn’t met them yet he already loves them with his whole heart, which is so much love that sometimes he can’t sleep with all the jittery energy locked beneath his chest.

Apparently Mito, who he guesses is (was?) probably his fianceé, has met hers, a girl from Lightning Country who isn’t named in the missive but has been taken in as a ward by the Clan Head and is apparently settling in quite well.

Hashirama looks up at his father, who stares back with an ever-inscrutable expression that he can’t read. He…doesn’t know how to feel about this, actually. He has no attachment to Mito beyond their engagement and even that was arranged without him knowing – he wasn’t upset, really, being told he’d been assigned a wife, but he wasn’t exactly happy, either. Arranged marriages are a part of Clan life, and it wasn’t shocking that, as Clan heir, he’d be expected to have one.

That’s sort of how he feels now.

He’s glad that Mito has her soulmate and hopes that they’ll be very happy together, but from what he can tell the Uzumaki haven’t actually broken the engagement and would be willing to continue with it if Butsuma so wishes – he thinks that it’s pretty common in their culture to have a legal spouse and a loving partner, which, if it came to be, would likely be the case here. He himself is just…fine with marrying Mito, honestly. He likes making new friends and having a wife is just like having a Super Best Friend who’s permanent.

He must have been quiet too long, stewing over the news in his head, because Father interrupts his train of thought with “You’ll be marrying her, of course, and while it’s not ideal I suppose it was going to happen at some point if you and the girl did not turn out to be soulmates, which was unlikely anyway. We’ll just add a stipulation for infidelity as it applies to soulmates, and as long as the girl’s soulmate does not interfere with her marriage to you and her duty to bear you heirs, it will be fine. There’ll be another clause for you, too, when you meet your soulmate.” A pause that goes unnoticed, to his father's annoyance. “Hashirama. Are you listening?”

Hashirama is startled, not only because although he hadn't realized it, _of course_ almost all arranged partnerships would have to have soulmate clauses, but because of Father’s uncharacteristic reasonableness about the whole thing. He murmurs out a yes and sits through another couple hours of legal nonsense that he can’t really understand, but he spends the whole time thinking about _his_ soulmate and by the time he’s dismissed because he can’t focus anymore he’s in one of his moods.

He goes to Tobirama first, because his last little brother is so cute and precious and almost always is doing something that Hashirama can interrupt and be annoyingly overbearing about – balm to the soul of any elder sibling – but it’s just katas, and he’s clearly been doing them since soon after Hashirama left that morning because he looks _exhausted_ and is only seven but still a fully-fledged shinobi, which means that he trains until his soft small hands bruise and bleed and his little face is red with over-exertion and dripping with sweat. Hashirama doesn’t stay. He hates watching Tobes train. It’s depressing and boring and reminds him too much of Butsuma, who isn’t Tobirama but is influencing him too much for comfort. It breaks his heart, watching their father beat the humanity out of him like that.

He walks to the river. Madara isn’t there; they hadn’t arranged a meeting today, so he just sits by himself and thinks about how lonely he is even in his compound surrounded by his clansmen with no soulmate. The water is cool when he dips his feet in it, and he watches it flow by until he falls asleep and is rudely woken up by the sensation of rocks digging into his side.

 

“Oh,” says Madara, when Hashirama is finished with his honestly not that interesting account of the morning’s events. “That was honestly not that interesting, you know. A bad story.”

Hashirama tosses a rock at his face and is slightly mollified when it strikes true. “Yeah,” he mutters, resting his chin on his hands. “Nothing in my life would make a good story right now.”

Madara yells at him then, because what about having a secret peace-loving best friend who is the heir to a Clan you’re at war with wouldn’t be a good story, and then Hashirama yells back because _what the hell_ Madara is an Uchiha? And then Madara says he’s an idiot for not figuring out and honestly they’ve both been on the battlefield, the Mokuton really isn’t _that_ forgettable, you stupid bowl-cut Senju, and then Hashirama tackles him into the river because it’s not stupid, Tobirama cut his hair for him so it can’t be!

When they wrestle their way back to shore Madara tells him that of course it looks stupid and that’s probably why he did it, so that the dumb outside matches the dumber inside, and Hashirama is so busy wailing about such a bitter betrayal from his own beloved baby brother that he doesn’t notice said baby brother staring at the two of them with a concussed expression and a sword slipping from his lax fingers as Senju Butsuma looms over him and two other shinobi, a man and a child, both wearing the uchiwa and red-lacquered armor, glare at Madara from the other shore of the Nakano.


	2. (lamb to the slaughter)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tobirama has a heart-to-heart with himself and almost drowns. Mito endures the typical patriarchal attitude of authority figures in this era. Hashirama cries in an overly dramatic manner for no discernable reason. Kyashi commits some crimes against visitation propriety and will probably have to apologize for it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so i actually spent most of yesterday Not studying for my midterms and instead planning so i do actually have some kind of pl*t.....unrelated but i offered to show this to the friend who helped inspire it and she immediately got really sick before i could even send it to her which feels like a message but that won't stop me because i cant read. No Beta Or Preview We Die Like Wlw.
> 
> the spacing is kinda odd but i really didn't feel like doing more than copy/pasting lmao here are another ~5k words as an apology for shit formatting

IN THE HEART OF THE KONOHA FORESTS, HI NO KUNI, WARRING CLANS ERA

 

Three weeks have elapsed since Hashirama’s ill-thought-out relationship with the Uchiha heir was exposed. He hasn’t stopped moping since, and he sends Tobirama sharp, injured glares when he thinks he’s not looking.

He isn’t, to be fair, but he hasn’t got the attention for anything right now. That was a very distracting day and ever since Tobirama has slept fitfully if he sleeps at all, and more often than not he’ll lay tangled in his sheets, glazed uncomfortably in cold sweat and just trying to digest the absolute gut-wrenching world-toppling revelation that _Uchiha Madara_ is his _soulmate._

Which somehow doesn’t manage to be worse than the fact that the bastard in question apparently _didn’t_ _notice_ the formation of their soulbond and the whole part where their chakra signatures had reached out and nearly suffocated each other, which seems impossible (because it is, Tobirama thinks unkindly, unless your name is Spots and you’ve got nothing but smoke and hairballs in between your ears where a brain would theoretically be in a normal person), and Tobirama is forced to admit that since it isn’t a one-sided bond – he’s a sensor, and he was absorbed enough in the utterly addicting smothering storm of Madara’s chakra to notice the telltale fluctuations and imprints that always occur when two soulmates meet for the first time – the Uchiha must be a true world-class idiot, a complete dumbass who somehow survived as the heir to a prominent shinobi clan while possessing all of the observational skills of a rock. Famed for their visual acuity, are the Uchiha. Nothing slips by them, according to legend, and everything within the range of the Sharingan is burned into the user’s memory forever. 

Except, apparently, Tobirama, who is either just not important enough to be worth even one off-hand glance or is so inferior to his brother that a shred of spare attention would be wasted on him. 

He glumly tosses the kunai he’s been twirling into the outer bark of a nearby redwood and slumps to the forest floor, closing his eyes and letting the ancient hum of the trees’ chakra soothe the pulsing headache that’s been bothering him since the encounter.

Butsuma was too busy yelling at Hashirama for being a traitor to yell at Tobirama for being so distracted that he nearly got himself gutted by a small, particularly nasty weasel, which is a small mercy that did not carry over into the following days when his performance had not improved.

He’s a born sensor, and on the best of days that leaves him overwhelmed with his nerves rubbed raw and sparking in pain at every brush of chakra he can’t block out, but he’s learned to cope with that and carry on regardless. This sudden hyperfixation on the solar flare of energy that he can sense even miles away from the Uchiha compound is new and absolutely confounding; Tobirama dreams about smoke and sparks and black hair and red pinwheel eyes and the sensations follow him into his waking hours. It’s a fog of awareness he can’t see clearly through, like a cataract that suppresses every corner of his perception. He wants to roll around in this feeling and wrap himself in it so thoroughly that his entire being is constantly cloaked in the hazy euphoria of _madaramadaramadara_ until even the blockhead himself notices. He wishes with his whole heart that it would just _go away already_. 

Tobirama wonders absently if this is what his summons feel like when they get ahold of catnip and resolves to apologize to Yuuki for scolding him for The Pond Incident, which has remained a bitter point of contention between the two of them for almost a year now.

He’s taken permission from Father to camp in the old forests for a few days as a training retreat, with the excuse that the heady shroud of spiritual energy and nature chakra will center him and help him clear his head of the intoxicating effects of a soulbond seen through sensor’s sight. It was difficult to pull that lie off without also admitting he had met his soulmate – his father would have made the connection instantly and Sage only knows what would have happened then – but it isn’t truly a falsehood: he does feel more settled, more like himself and less like he’s going to die if he doesn’t immediately smother himself in essence of Uchiha, which is embarrassing enough to even think about that his back starts to burn like it’s been sprayed by acid and set on fire simultaneously—and that’s…not embarrassment, is it. 

Oh, no.

Tobirama claws at his dirt-stained, sweat-soaked yukata and scrambles to dunk himself into the nearby stream, a tributary of the Nakano that he’d followed from its source until he’d gotten to this clearing, but before he manages to actually take his shirt off he goes tumbling head-first into ice-cold, ice-clear river water with a muffled yelp and an explosion of bubbles.

The only things he feels now are the wet, heavy tug of the twisted shirt around his arms and neck and the frigidity of lingering winter, and Tobirama’s head is completely empty for one, two, three, five, ten, thirty seconds before he comes back to himself. He is, for the first time in three agonizing weeks, completely sense-blind from the shock of the cold, and he’s so goddamn _relieved_ to be free of that particular agony that he almost sucks in a lungful of water before he realizes he should probably get out. 

Tobirama drags himself back to shore – kind of pathetic, really, since now that he’s not consumed by whatever the hell _that_ was, he sees that the brooklet, even swollen as it is by melted snow and the recent rains, is only shoulder-deep, and narrow enough that his short body can nearly stretch from bank to bank. He successfully wrestles out of his wet yukata and then his breeches too after a moment of thought, not wanting hypothermia from sodden clothes no matter how much the odd sensation on his back still feels like there’s an entire colony of fire ants trapped under his skin.

His mind is a lot clearer, now, with Madara’s blaze of chakra a blinding spot in his peripheral awareness instead of totally eclipsing his headspace, but that means that he can pay more attention to the fact that whatever’s wrong with his back really, _really_ hurts, and he has no idea what could be causing it – he’s no Hyuuga, with no Byakugan to see through his own head, but he can sense the tenketsu channels in his own body, if with many obstructions, and his chakra feels like it’s _boiling_ , which cannot be good. The nerves running the length of his spine and branching out beneath his muscles and shoulder blades to wrap around his ribcage feel like they had the moment he’d first tried to use a Raiton jutsu and his entire body had been lit up from within by the sudden influx of electric energy. Tobirama shivers and tries to channel his chakra into a small iryō technique to soothe his inflamed nerves and calm the pain, but that just causes a fresh new wave of hurt to crest.

He attempts a small Suiton, next, a jutsu he’s used many times before to soak Hashirama’s head when he becomes too Hashirama-like, with the same results.

He cannot channel his chakra, he realizes. His own body buckles under the sensation of a strange caustic corruption whenever he tries, and the pain interrupts him from properly performing jutsus and explanations are slipping out between his fingers whenever he tries to put what’s happening in some kind of _context_ — do all soulmate meetings have these kinds of effects or is Tobirama just cursed like his clansmen have always said—

Soulmate meeting.

It’s been three weeks since the Nakano, since Madara, slightly long for the formation of his soulmark, but not unusually so; oh, he better make sure this _never_ gets out, if only because Tōka will laugh herself _sick_ when she learns Tobirama _forgot_ about the basic basics of soulbonds and panicked like a chicken with its head cut off when his Mark appeared.

Tobirama groans and slumps down against a tree in a fit of despair that would do Hashirama proud. Attempting to suffocate himself in his own wet clothes is not becoming of a ninja, he tells himself. He can’t just sit out here forever and become a moss-covered forest hermit when he is the spare heir and is needed on the battlefield to fight for his slighted ancestors and blah blah blah et cetera blah blah.

The burning is fading, slightly, replaced by pins and needles that tickle at his spine, which should mean that it’s safe to use chakra now that there’s no risk of accidentally interfering with the Mark, something he’d just forgotten, like—like _Hashirama_ would, and that honestly hurts more than the stupid Mark ever did.

Not as much, though, as remembering the old wives’ tales about prospective soulmates, and how your Mark takes longer to appear and hurts more when it does if your soulmate knows of you and dislikes you for some reason. He recalls the low-pitched gossiping of the kitchen workers, cooing sympathetically over one of their coworkers after she met her match, a Hagoromo kunoichi who had only looked at her long enough to see the Senju crest on her robes before she’d darted away into the shadows, back into Uchiha territory. 

“Terrible luck,” were the words of one of the pastry chefs, his voice just loud enough to be audible over the soft sounds of her weeping. “It’s not your fault, Kiki, maybe you’ll see her again! Not like you _chose_ to be on opposite sides of the war just for the romantic drama…kind of rude of her, just dashing off like that when she probably should have figured out you’re not even a shinobi…having the nerve to be _angry_ at you…” 

Tobirama – _Senju_ Tobirama, Butsuma’s second son – saw the look on Uchiha Izuna’s face when he caught him staring at his brother, the barely articulated fury that look had prompted and the vengeful Katon jutsus that had left his hair smoldering, and decides that if he has to spend one more moment alone with his traitorous thoughts than he’ll just hop right back into the river and do his level best to drown himself, damn the consequences.

Tobirama bites into his thumb and half-heartedly slaps a palm against the earthen bank: if anyone can keep him company without making him feel worse right now, it’s his summons. Mizushi pops into existence with a cloud of silvery smoke and a high-pitched yelp at the indignity of almost being Summoned right into a river, but her irritated chattering stops short once she sees him curled up in the roots of a tree, covered in dirt and not even complaining about it.

He doesn’t notice he’s crying until the warm sandpaper rasp of her tongue cleans the snot and tears off his face, which just makes him hiccup and cry _harder_ , because he couldn’t manage this kind of sadness at Itama and Kawarama’s funerals, but one encounter with his Clan’s sworn enemies (his _soulmate)_ has him sniffling into Mizushi’s thick fur like a _baby_.

There’s the shuffle of paws on earth, and she noses him to his feet. Tobirama is, to his great dismay, nearly the same age as Mizushi, but he stands at eye level with her and is nowhere near as cute or fuzzy, which is to be expected of him as a human being who is not and never will be a snow leopard but still seems to him to be outrageously unfair.

Her whiskers tickle his overheated cheeks and he giggles a little at that, the brush of her pelt on his bare skin and the pressure of her body wound around his making his problems not seem quite so big and his emotions about them not quite so overwhelming.

Tobirama squirms in his summons’ hold until he can rest his head on her shoulder and trace the shimmering smoky rosettes along her side with numbed fingers. Mizushi noses at his back with a rumbling chirp and the ghosting of downy fur and whiskers on the still-raw soulmark is like a balm, and he’s further calmed.

There really is nothing like a cat to make you feel better when you’re down, Tobirama knows, and this is yet another example that proves his hypothesis to be airtight.

“You’ve met your soulmate,” she says, her tone disapproving, and his eyes burn with tears at the thought of how much he’s not wanted but he’s already cried more today than he has in a year, so he chokes them back and answers, his voice only a little wobbly instead of cracking.

“Yeah,” Tobirama replies, the sound very small in the heavy forest dusk, “he’s an Uchiha. Hashirama’s friend, the one he thought was secret but really wasn’t to anyone with eyes?”

Mizushi makes a noise of understanding – this is far from the first time he’s complained about his anija’s river trips and how it leaves him as the sole object of Butsuma’s fierce scrutiny – and begins to lick his soulmark in long, gentle strokes. 

“Father made me follow him, like I didn’t already know it was happening because for a ninja Anija is like, criminally horrible at stealth, and I think it might get him someday, but I didn’t know he would follow me and bring _weapons_ —well, I brought my sword just in case but I had already been practicing my kenjutsu and I didn’t have my faceguard or anything.” The leopard stops grooming him at that and he can feel the cold weight of her judgement on the back of his neck – his summons have made it _very_ clear time and time again about what they think of both Senju Butsuma and the training regimens Tobirama endures to keep Hashirama from having to do the same, and leaving behind protective gear is something he’d promised repeatedly not to do – so he hurries on and continues talking. “And I was hiding in the bushes ‘cause I’m not Hashirama and I can actually cloak my presence and not make _noise_ when I’m in shinobi mode, but Father just burst out as soon as he caught up, and then when he did that so did Uchiha Tajima and that bastard weasel, Izuna, and then I don’t really remember what happened.”

A pause. Mizushi is silent, but a quick read of her energy reveals her to be expectant, so he continues with his account of The Nakano Incident, which blurs out in his memories after that. 

“And when it was all over like two hours later and I finally could think again my arm and leg and chest were bleeding, so I think maybe the rat managed to get some hits on me which is annoying but not really surprising since I like, blacked out, and I’d just realized it was because I had a soulmate when Father was about to _murder_ Anija—maybe not actually kill him but I couldn’t tell the difference so I said something that I can’t remember and then time passed and we were both in really big trouble and here we are.” 

Mizushi tucks her broad head into the crook of his neck, tickling the soft skin there with the bristles of her whiskers and keeping her silence. The rhythmic rise and fall of her chest as she breathes and the heavenly warmth of her dappled fur lull Tobirama into the kind of calming trance he hasn’t felt since his mother died, and before he knows it he’s asleep, hidden beneath the shadows of the forest.

 

 

SENJU CLAN COMPOUND, HI NO KUNI, WARRING CLANS ERA

 

SEVERAL WEEKS LATER

 

It’s Mito’s very first time away from the island, and even though she’s accompanied by her mother and the Handmaidens and even her brand-new soulmate, she still feels vulnerable, like an exposed nerve but a thousand times worse.

There are hundreds of eyes trained on her, and only years of etiquette training keep her spine tall and straight and her posture from wavering under the weight of the staring. Her hair is bound up in two buns, and she had looked pretty when Chiyoko had shown her the mirror that morning, but now the hairstyle just yanks painfully at her scalp and the kanzashi sticks pinch at the roots and the seal papers dangling from her head are tickling the sides of her neck.

  
She’s trying to focus on the physical discomfort so that she can more easily tune out the continuous monotone droning of Senju Butsuma, the most competent Clan Head this people have had in decades and also the most _boring_. He’s not really anything special; Mito had looked him over politely as she had been introduced to him and he was just another tall old man, with brown hair in a rather unfortunate cut and stiff, unworn ceremonial robes, but he sure can _talk_. 

Mito squints up at the sun and by its position she can tell that at least three hours have passed since the engagement renegotiations began, and despite her impressive hold on her reserved outward shell, she feels like she might literally explode if she has to sit awkwardly like this any longer. Her calves are starting to cramp, and she can see Kyashi seated to her left, very maturely suppressing a wince as she accidentally moves her neck and something _cracks_.

Mother is being the Clan Head now and the Handmaidens are lined up against the wall in their finest layered armor, statue-still and menacing in their strength. The obvious signs of Uzushio’s power and prosperity are comforting in this strange, cold land, so far from home and so _different_ with its too-white sun and the tall deciduous trees and the air that smells of musty forest and overturned earth without carrying even a hint of the salty-tropical-seawater Mito has grown up breathing in. The people are different, too, she thinks with a mental sigh, turning minutely to better ogle the gangly-looking brown-haired boy who is _fidgeting_ like he’s not the heir to his Clan and a shinobi and already in the double digits. It’s rather unbecoming, an unfortunate trait only emphasized by whatever that is that he seems to think is _appropriate wear_ for a formal political setting, and his hair, which is shiny and straight and might be rather pretty if it didn’t look like a coconut someone had hacked open and then dropped sideways on top of his head.

He notices Mito staring, which somehow just galls her more, and _smiles_ at her, bright and shiny and nearly painful with how happy it is, and in her periphery, she can vaguely sense Kyashi trying to subtly boggle at what _strange_ people inhabit Fire Country. She can’t help but agree. She may have only known Kyashi for barely two months, but they spent pretty much that entire time together and Mito is thoroughly satisfied that for the most part, her soulmate is a person of impeccable taste and judgement, with eagle-sharp eyes for details and a very intimidating glare that had warded off some of the creepier Senju elders when they’d tried to sneak too close to a pair of girls.

Good, Mito thinks viciously, switching tracks to give an ugly stare to the old bag behind Butsuma’s left. She is a princess and a kunoichi and she’s not gonna let some gross old geezer try to ‘size her up’ to see if she is proper bride material for their lauded Hashirama.

The lauded Hashirama, who is currently attempting to play footsie with Kyashi, despite the fact that they are seated at opposite ends of a decently large room and _everyone_ can see them. Kyashi looks like she’s two seconds away from taking out her new yari – oh, she’d been _delighted_ to learn about the specialization many Uzushio-nin have in sōjutsu, and even happier when she was introduced to the wonder of storage seals – and spear him through the middle like a fish. Mito tries not to laugh at the thought, and mostly succeeds because the mental image of Hashirama impaled on a trident like a carp mostly just makes her feel disgusted and sad and vaguely guilty for reasons she doesn’t want to examine too closely.

Hashirama, she knows, has a seal on him to keep his soul from triggering a Bond with another, should that happen to come up while the islanders are visiting; it had been specially requested of the delegation in the agreement to host further marriage negotiations, and it had been slapped on his forearm by Mother the moment they had arrived. It itches at Mito – how can they just do that, keep this weird boy from finding his other part, especially since Mito has brought hers into talks about their wedding? It seems awfully unfair and kind of sad, really, since Hashirama might as well find happiness as soon as he can if he won’t get that from Mito. 

Kyashi had been distant, when informed that Mito was already engaged: she’s kind of a jealous friend, but she’s reasonable and not a gross creep, and she had said last night that no matter what she trusted Mito, a statement that had warmed her to the tips of her toes, so she’s here as emotional support, and also to start learning how being a prominent figure in a noble clan works. Her parents had apparently just forgotten her when they’d left with Ginkaku and Kinkaku, which seems very wrong and also fake, since everything Kyashi has said about them would point to a loving, supportive family life. In lieu of their absence she’s been adopted as a ward by Lady Toro, and is technically an Uzumaki now, since she has no Clan name that she’s aware of and she’s Mito’s soulmate anyway. 

It’s been another 45 minutes of memorizing the elaborate patterns on her furisode and trying to keep her brain from melting out her ears when the problem child abruptly stands up and whispers something to his father, who frowns but is consequently exposed to the saddest, most pathetic pair of puppy-eyes Mito has ever seen, and nods in acquiescence. The boy turns to Mito and Kyashi, then, again with that smile, and blurs out of the room with a gesture that she interprets to mean ‘follow me’.

Butsuma sighs at the interruption but tips his head at them in permission to follow.

“My son wishes to show you the compound and introduce you to some of his cousins and our customs here in Fire Country,” he says, his voice gravelly and tired. “He believes that keeping you here in the talks would be counterproductive, since you’re both still children and are truly only here for appearances’ sake.”

Akira looks almost surprised, at that, but nods firmly and looks back at Mito and her friend.

“You can go, girls, as long as you remember to keep to yourselves and not disturb our hosts. Chiyoko will shadow you, but Hashirama knows the compound better than she does, and I think he would make a fine guide.”

Mito can practically _feel_ the skepticism radiating off her soulmate, but they’re both bursting with energy and chakra and she believes that if she has to sit here for just one more minute steam might start blowing out of her ears, so she just bows in thanks and tugs Kyashi in the direction Hashirama had vanished in. It’s better than listening to dull-eyed adults discuss Mito like she’s some kind of object and not literally right there, well within hearing range.

It turns out that the Senju heir, while a pathologic people-pleaser, has very poor ideas on what could be considered entertainment. Mito is standing in a bedroom in the Main House, awkwardly watching Hashirama fuss over the ill-looking ghost on the futon as Kyashi hovers in the doorway, visibly annoyed at being made to attend to some brat.

Apparently the younger brother, Tobirama, caught pneumonia a little while ago, and since he’s an albino his immune system is weak and takes longer to fight infections – “Why are you telling us this. Is he gonna die or what-” “Yessh, A-ni-ja, whaaat’re you dooooin’…” – so Hashirama has been diligently shadowing him, playing nurse and bringing him scrolls to read when his fever dips low enough for the delirium to pass.

Mito expected a lot of things from the rumors she’d heard about Senju Tobirama, but a tiny boy her age, huddled under a small mountain of blankets and body pillowed on the torso of a snow leopard bigger than he is was not one of them, and she certainly didn’t expect to be present for her betrothed arguing with his brother over medication.

Hashirama is five minutes into force-feeding Tobirama antibiotics and has him in a decent headlock – the ghost puts up a pretty strong fight for someone who already looks dead – when he notices a soulmark poking out of the collar of his sweat-damp sleep shirt and goes ballistic.

Mito is rather impressed, secretly, that it’s possible for one human being to have so many powerful emotions all at once and still not manage to express a single coherent thing. She’s also mostly put off, because it’s not that weird for a kid to meet their soulmate so young and Hashirama is making _so much noise_.

There’s a lot of yelling and wailing and sobbing and cooing that she tunes out, feeling rather like an unwanted intruder, which she is, witnessing such a dramatic display of brotherly affection. Kyashi sneaks a hand around her wrist and tugs her out of the room, to her great relief.

 

“Okay,” says her soulmate, once they’ve retreated safely to the koi pond and bravely survived a chewing-out from Chiyoko for abandoning Hashirama like that, “he’s crazy. Your husband is crazy.”

Mito huffs, because he’s _not her husband_ , but… “He really is weird, isn’t he. Why did he promise to show us around the place and then just fuss over his brother? I mean, I get that that’s the last brother and all, but…” she gestures vaguely in an attempt to convey her point, which Kyashi, bless her, seems to understand and nods adamantly in agreement, before she has an inconvenient stroke of thoughtfulness.

  
“That’s the nerd one, yeah?” “Hmm?” “What’s-his-name, Tobes, he’s the nerd brother, right?” “Oh, Tobirama? Yeah, he is, Hashirama spent the entire walk over to his room babbling about what a mean confusing genius his baby brother is. Did you not listen to that? I suffered through it, so you should have to too.” “Oh, I just hear crashing waves whenever he opens his mouth. It’s like white noise. But maybe as an apology you could teach him how to write.” “…Do you mean seal-script,” Mito says, looking strangely over at Kyashi and where she’s yanked up the hem of her kimono to dip her feet in someone else’s koi pond.

“Yep,” comes the response, completely unabashed, which makes her think about how much Kyashi seems to disdain Hashirama and how much like him she’s acting right now… “If he’s a nerd genius, you have to assume he’s already literate, you know.” “Well _yah_ , but he definitely seems like he’d be into seals, and it would probably be a good show of trust an’ all that. Teaching the second son your prized secret fūinjutsu, officially extending an olive branch, burying your boyfriend alive in his dumb garden… That’s what alliances are all _about_ , Mito, c’mon, get in the spirit!” 

Mito shoots a wary look over to her soulmate, who is now knee-deep in the pond and trying not to giggle as the fish nibble gently at her bare toes. It’s infuriatingly cute, and it seems like it should be illegal to be so charming, and Mito resolves to make that a law as soon as she becomes Clan Head. She thinks back to Hashirama and his god-awful pinstripes and stupid haircut and unfortunately magnetic personality and _considers_.

“Maybe I should.”

“Good to hear, but that also means you have to help me shave plant-man’s head as soon as we get the chance, because either the hairstyle changes or I go blind from being forced to look at it, and if we wait too long I might just go with the second.”

“Hmm…as long as we do something about the wardrobe too. That boy is a walking disaster and someone ought to show him how to at least appear like a normal human being.” 

Kyashi grins mischievously up at her and Mito smirks back, fox-like and knife-sharp, and begins spinning a hundred possible plans for this alliance in the back of her head.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> also i cant respond to comments rn cause HellBrain is.. Like That... but i see them all and i love the,m and more importantly you, the reader
> 
> you so  
> fucken  
> valid  
> when you  
> ~comment~ or don't if you can't but all of your support is greatly appreciated


	3. what you gon' do?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Madara gets dangerously close to being correct about something important, but luckily he manages to dismiss it completely and will not think about it for at least another decade. Hashirama is very audibly upset about Tobes's mystery soulmate refusing to make him an honest man, and this argument is already way too old even though it's only been a month since the damn soulmark appeared in the first place. Tobirama's unrepentant nerdery is sanctioned by a foreign state and he seriously considers immigration. Kyashi has feelings, and Mito gets into a fistfight with her girlfriend and her future brother-in-law.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yall im so hyped the incredible response 2 this is WACK and it's making me write wayyyy more this week than i have in literal months which is neat but also i have no faith in myself soooooo i should say that updates may slow down :-( BUT...here is another one.............this time ft. madara, who some of you may have noticed is a complete and total dumbass, just a real stupid idiot boy. its because kishimoto doesnt know shit so im making nardo canon how it Should have been , therefore hashirama and madara have to share one brain cell between the two of them and that's also why theyre so in sync. hashirama was so weird after madara died in canon bc he wasn't used to having the brain cell full time and it was like temperature shock but for minds
> 
> also idk if ill ever include tsunade or even make mito a jinchuuriki in this but if those things happen 1) shes gonna have red hair cause uzumaki lives matter and 2) she will have the whisker marks cause like....if thats the thing w naruto.....then shouldn't mito's kids have em too?? meets literally invented being bijuukin so........ i have enormous brain energy just thinking abt redheaded tsuna w whiskers im crying we dont deserve girls and especially not senju tsunade.
> 
> maybe i'll make her the next uzumaki matriarch cause senju lives do NOT matter. thats butsuma's fault tho. f
> 
> also timeline-wise it's about may (when this chapter begins) so tobirama and izuna turned 7 in february, mito has just turned 8 (QUEEN OF TAURUS RIGHTS my birthday is only 5 days after hers!!! i'll be 17 on may 8th!!!), madara turned 10 in december and hashirama too at some point during that last year cause idk when exactly his bday is and i dont feel like googling it rn lmao, i just did a fantastic job of forgetting everyone else's birthdays but that might not matter cause there like.....isnt anyone else rn. kyashi will turn 8 on halloween cause fuck yeah and also v. vaska, veerska circuit ., sc*rpio solidarity

UCHIHA CLAN COMPOUND, HI NO KUNI, WARRING CLANS ERA

 

It’s been over a month since the abrupt, painful appearance of Madara’s soulmark, and because Izuna is a horrible person who doesn’t deserve any love, much less the focused care and adoration he receives from his own older brother, he's taken to rumormongering about it. Azuki walked up to him the other day – bless his gentle soul, waiting so long to bring up such a mortifyingly embarrassing rumor regarding his own kin, one that has resulted in much snide mocking from Madara’s older clansmen - asking if it was _really_ true that the reason he had been so poisonously grumpy was because he, a Clan heir and sensor, had somehow overlooked _meeting his soulmate_ and consequently did not know who, exactly, the Mark branded on his arm is supposed to represent.

Madara abruptly decided to have an impromptu training session with his half-brother that ended in a good deal of violence committed to Azuki’s person and two long hours in the healing tent being laughed weakly at for fretting over several light burns and a broken leg that he had caused in the first place. That particular comment had managed to so thoroughly ruined whatever lift in mood Madara had managed to get from beating the pulp out of his younger brother that he had to leave to go seek out his _other_ younger brother, who’s always fun to tease and has a great deal to answer for right now.

He’d caught Izuna settled primly on their mother’s lap like a housecat, getting his silken hair brushed to a shine. He was stuffing his stupid traitorous baby-face with salmon onigiri and had the sheer nerve to play innocent when his Clan heir demanded (politely and with restraint. _Definitely_ with no ill-advised, dangerous applications of Katon that someone his age should really know better than to play with indoors, and any words to the contrary are vicious lies) to know what exactly the fuck he thinks he’s been doing walking around spreading _vile slander_ about his betters. He tried to grab at Izuna’s hair and the little weasel choked on the onigiri he’d ungracefully shoved in his mouth to keep Madara from getting to them, because he’s a tiny shithead and a bastard, through and through. It made Kaa-chan raise her voice, but it was genuinely worth it in the face of what whispers he’s been overhearing for the past few weeks.

She had not seen it that way, though, so they’d both been kicked out of the house alongside their practice weapons with the logic that if they’re energetic enough to roughhouse like monkeys indoors than they’re certainly both well enough to train with their father.

Izuna may be a little bastard, but he too is Tajima’s son, and so had stood in solidarity with Madara when it was decided that they would do whatever possible from here on out to avoid getting sentenced with what the man considers _training_.

Instead of getting them both beat black and blue, Izuna, being the horrible goblin he is, suggested they take a walk down to the Nakano and see if they can spot one of the Senju boys he’s taken to cursing in his sleep, since Madara is apparently far too lenient on his brother and has allowed him to spend weeks under the delusion that Madara’s soulmark corresponds with one of them. Madara himself takes great joy in following through on that offer with a few small changes and is considerably cheered at the sight of Izuna scrambling for purchase in the river’s shallows and spitting wet black bangs out of his mouth with disgust. He is enormously grateful for the recent awakening of his Sharingan so that he’ll never have to risk forgetting what his little brother looked like, floundering about in water that only comes up to his chest like a landed carp.

Honestly, like his soulmate would be Hashirama, who is sort of alright despite his lineage and everything about his appearance and everything about him in general but still _Hashirama_ , or some other horrible Senju snake who dreams about Uchiha heads on pikes and murders children and other activities the Senju are known to take pleasure in.

He ignores the heartbroken sobbing at the back of his head that blubbers about how it’s so _mean_ to talk about the Clan like that, but if Madara’s stupid Senju friend wants to keep him from thinking darkly about them than he can just hurry up and make everyone in his Clan good and not murderous and bring back all of the too-small bodies they’ve had to put to rest in gilded, chakra-treated urns.

The Mark on his arm – a twisting dragon of water wrought beautifully in a hundred shades of blue and silver, the form reminding him unerringly of calligraphy, or perhaps seal-script – sears in pain that feels like frostbite, sometimes, when he thinks about Hashirama and his kin, which Madara has taken to mean that whoever his soulmate is, they obviously better taste than most people could ever dream of, reacting so harshly at thoughts that bring Madara pain. Not always, though, so maybe he was right about Hashirama being okay: maybe the other boy truly was sincere in his offers of peace and starry-eyed fawning over what kind of restaurants and markets and gardens they could have in a village with no dead children.

Madara snorts, then, both at the idea that Hashirama could ever be anything less than wholeheartedly sincere, and the _face_ Izuna makes when he finally manages to right himself on shore and pull all of the hair out of his too-big mouth.

He stops snorting when the weasel takes advantage of his distraction and hurls _him_ into the river for good measure, without even having the manners to make sure he doesn’t land in the strongest currents. There’s a very strange feeling of déjà vu that washes over Madara the moment he breaks the surface, and he imagines that his Mark is buzzing with what feels like foreign chakra – a heavenly sensation like summer rain and heavy mists that lasts only a moment before it vanishes – but the current is doing its level best to tug him down, and he hauls himself onto the riverbank before he drowns.

Izuna is cackling, a full-bodied mean-spirited laugh that makes his small shoulders shake and stains his pale face pink. Madara grits his teeth and keeps himself from frying his last full brother alive in a truly admirable display of self-control, even though the boy has almost keeled over by now and looks alarmingly close to choking on his own mirth.

He’d deserve it.

Madara snarls wordlessly at Izuna from where his brother has collapsed on the ground, still soaking and gasping for breath as – are those _tears_ , that melodramatic motherfucker – his chest shakes. There’s an unnatural heat rising to his face from the buildup of leashed fire chakra in his body, and distantly he is aware that there’s steam curling off his shoulders and around his face, but he doesn’t care.

Madara is a proud, dignified son of his line, and he will not lose his temper over his baby brother dunking him in the Nakano and then promptly having a hilarity-induced stroke about it; he is fully capable of performing the Uchiha Grand Fireball, and is recognized as an adult in the Clan because of it; he is ten entire years old, which is several years too many to cave to the taunting floating over his shoulders.

It’s not _Madara’s_ fault his soulmate didn’t even bother to introduce themself, nor is it his fault that they haven’t mustered the nerve to come within Madara’s sensing range. He’s a little hurt by that, truthfully, and as he stomps back to the compound he resolves to put it behind him and act like a true Uchiha in this matter, loving his life partner wholly, unconditionally, and without reservation, even though he doesn’t know who they are beyond ghostly impressions of even-ocean-platinum and feline-winter-fog.

He burns the lingering sensations into his mind and his heart with the Sharingan. He has to treasure these small snatches of the soulmate he doesn’t remember meeting. Madara suppresses the thought as best he can but it keeps bubbling up and tugging at his awareness; he is really only angry at himself for coming close enough to the stranger who will one day be his most precious person to instigate the formation of a Bond and then just letting them slip away from him like the water still dripping through his fingers.

  
AT THE SHORE OF THE EASTERN SEA, HI NO KUNI, WARRING CLANS ERA

SEVERAL DAYS IN THE FUTURE

 

Tobirama is newly recovered from his illness, _no thanks to Hashirama_ , but despite his restored health he’s still being fluttered over like a newborn fawn who doesn’t quite know how to walk yet.

Surely, he thinks, it will only be a matter of time before there’s an opportunity for me to just disappear forever and escape Anija’s mother-henning.

Tobirama is accompanying Mito and the Uzushio-nin back to the island, just so he can deliver the courting gift to her in her own home as is proper, and then he’ll return. It’s not even a long journey; they’ll be traveling via transportation seals, something that makes his suppressed chakra thrash with anticipatory delight beneath his skin, and from what Mito’s soulmate has told him, Whirlpool Country is practically paradise. The village proper is so heavily fortified by fossilized layers of centuries’ worth of seals that the frequent hurricanes just blow over the place like it’s not there at all, and floodwaters and tsunamis reach the barrier but not a single drop of water goes further.

He’s giddy and ecstatic and is so very grateful for Tōka’s anchoring presence alongside him. She’s already been to Uzushio; she went with Butsuma when the original negotiations were had as a learning experience, and she’s refused to tell him much about it to save the surprise but Tobirama is certain in his heart of hearts that he will love the place.

Mito and the other girl are helping some of their guardians etch the seal into the sand, and are apparently being quizzed on fūinjutsu properties as they work; Tobirama catches snatches of a conversation involving pocket dimensions and interplanar travel and some kind of technique for conserving chakra, but with Hashirama practically draped over him and talking too loudly in his ear it’s nearly impossible to get the rest.

Think of the devil, apparently, and he shall restrain you with seagrasses because you weren’t listening closely enough.

“Tooooooooooobiiiiiii _raaaaa_ maaaaah~, are you ignoring me? Your beloved Anija? Say it isn’t _so_ , Tobes, I’m only working for your personal health and safety!”

Tōka’s laughter is clearly audible from where she’s barricaded herself out of Hashirama’s range of vision, the witch: she’s three whole years older than the Senju heir and has earned herself conditional immunity from his outbursts and feelings by virtue of her violently discouraging responses when exposed to them.

Tobirama puts in his best effort to escape his vegetative prison, to no avail; his brother may be one of the flightiest shinobi to have ever survived to claim ten years of age, but his Mokuton is basically invincible, and although he himself is the one who helped the big lug take it to where it is today, he is still no match for it.

Hashirama uses the opportunity to seize Tobirama’s face in his dry, warm hands, and _damn him_ for having such an earnest gaze even when he’s being so incredibly infuriating. Especially when he’s being so incredibly infuriating, because the Sage knows it’s the only way he’s gotten out of all of the trouble he gets himself into.

His eyes are huge and brown and free of tears for once, which is what gets Tobirama to stop struggling – Hashirama is honest and sincere pretty much all the time and is one of if not the worst liars in the Clan, but seriousness is not something that suits him naturally, and to see it now is calming despite the surge of anxiety that leaps up in his belly the moment the other’s mouth opens.

“Your soulmate,” Hashirama says softly and with all of the subtlety of a charging elephant, “they…they know you, don’t they. Who _are_ they, Tobes, why are you letting them hurt you like this!” Thankfully, his voice doesn’t rise to the usual pitches of despair that tend to occur when he gets in a mood, but the quiet is deafening all the same. Tobirama’s throat closes up at the indirect mention of Madara and he forces down a wave of nausea at the wildly conflicting sensations sparking from his Mark.

He’d thought it was a result of him catching cold after taking an unplanned swim in the river, but the heady, powerful rush of hate-grief-killing intent and longing-missing-love that have been frying his senses since the soulmark settled didn’t change unless he tried to reach out towards the fledgling Bond. Every attempt had resulted in a cold hard blankness where his connection to Madara should be anchored, which had just intensified whatever crisis of emotion he must be having, wherever he is.

The only conclusion Tobirama had been able to come to after hours of theorizing with his summons had been that Madara is at least peripherally aware of him, a Senju, but has not yet realized that he is also the soulmate he seems to be searching for so ardently. He has heard…rumors, about the Uchiha and the way they love, so fiercely and with such white-hot passion and jealous commitment that the gaping loss of soulmate and family is likely the primary reason they’re still fighting this war. It’s surreal to know that objectively and experience it firsthand, though. Madara’s near-blinding regard for Tobirama-the-soulmate is overwhelming on its own, but especially so when crudely juxtaposed against his opinion of Tobirama-the-person.

He never told Hashirama that, though. He only admitted to having a soulbond at all when he found out about the Mark, exposed as it was beneath the fever-haze of pneumonia.

Tobirama is _sure_ that the only thing his brother should know about his potential soulmate is the fact that the soulmate exists in the first place, which really isn’t anything more than he’d already been aware of.

Hashirama shuffles guiltily under the full impact of his flare and releases his Mokuton sheepishly. Tobirama isn’t displeased, exactly, at the chance to wipe sand out of his clothes and hair, but Hashirama continues to act like a cat caught with a paw in a birdcage, and he doesn’t seem to know he’s doing it until he gets a sharp kick to the shin and yelps.

“I’m _sorry_!” he wails, going from morose-guilty to caught-in-the-act impressively quickly. “It’s just—Yuuki was watching you too and it’s not my fault your summons are gossips and Mizushi apparently told him _something_ about your soulbond but I didn’t overhear anything more than the fact that they don’t like him and don’t think he should be making you feel so bad for no reason!” There’s no pause for breath until Hashirama looks to be on the verge of collapse, and thankfully he doesn’t continue talking much after that, just fixing his brother with his most pathetic pair of big sad cow eyes and jutting out his lip in a pout.

It doesn’t work.

“No,” snaps Tobirama, privately betrayed by the fact that his snow leopards are loose enough with things he tells them that _Hashirama_ was able to get something from it. He’s mostly just pissed, though, because it’s pretty much time to leave and he doesn’t want to be in a shitty mood when he finally gets to see the fūinjutsu capital of the world with his own two eyes. If he comes off as ungrateful, the likelihood that someone will take pity on him and teach him the bare bones of sealing theory will decrease dramatically, and he’s not in any kind of state to be entertaining his brother’s nosiness anyway.

Thankfully, that’s when Tōka gets tired of watching them bitch at each other and drags the human-shaped kudzu towards the farewell party of Senju, waving dismissively at Tobirama to get to the transportation matrix before he’s left behind altogether. Kyashi comes up then, too, because apparently good timing is a trait unique to the female species, and jerks her head back towards the completed seal in a clear signal to get his ass going already. He does so, only a little miffed at being ordered around like that and pushes all thoughts of Hashirama and Madara out of his head: he is determined to enjoy himself, damn it, and neither brother nor soulmate can stop him.

Upon closer examination, he discovers that sealwork really is an art, maybe even more so than the traditional paintings and music: the transport matrix blooms into a thousand delicate, deliberate lines beneath his sandals and winds back into and over itself so many times that staring at it too intensely for too long makes Tobirama’s head throb, although that could also be the nearly solid Yin chakra that the setup practically radiates. There’s such a complex, concentrated net of chakra worked into the whole thing that he has to marvel about how it was just _drawn into the sand_ and not something that took decades of work to draft and complete. Mito looks a little amused to see him gawping like a dead fish at something that she is obviously familiar with, but for Tobirama this is all new and he’ll be damned if he doesn’t properly breathe in this gorgeous maze-like jutsu before—

He doesn’t get to finish that thought before the ground shifts and swirls and melts away and the world falls out from under him, leaving him falling upwards into a shifting void of a myriad of colors and slipping away from consciousness.

 

UZUMAKI CLAN COMPOUND, UZUSHIO, WARRING CLANS ERA

LATER THAT SAME DAY

 

Kyashi stares with no small amount of amusement at the Senju from where he’s sprawled on a futon in her bedroom. She would be more obnoxious about the enjoyment she gets from watching him faint because of a transport seal, but…she reacted the same way when it was her first time, and that was only from one side of the island to another, not crossing the entire channel.

Maybe she ought to give the ghost-brat some more credit. He seems alright, and she really can’t be slinging around unfounded opinions about him when she’s only known him for a few weeks and he spent most of that time incapacitated in his bedroom.

It is pretty neat that he’s already got a summoning contract, though. Kyashi knows what snow leopards are – has seen them sometimes, when her previous parents took her with them to the Land of Iron over the mountains and then back again, but she thinks that if she had to choose any animal to have that kind of bond with, it would be the vultures.

There’s something to be said for a survivor, and eating corpses; sometimes just plain old bones, and hadn’t that been incredible to watch, is pretty cool in its own right, if rather gory.

The kid – Tobirama – seems to be coming back to wakefulness under the fond exasperation of Lady Monaka’s healing hands, which is a relief if only because it means they’re not gonna have to explain to his Clan why he took one jump across space-time and then died.

She can feel Mito’s patience running short. The girl has been nothing but an angel, letting herself be towed around by Hashirama and doing at least a passably decent job of pretending to listen to everything that came out of his mouth – a heroic feat, in Kyashi’s humble opinion, since she herself had just turned off her hearing aids and put up with being scolded for inattentiveness – and now she’s once again sitting by the bedside of the younger brother, who is no longer gravely ill and should be able to hold a conversation now.

She knows Mito’s been excited about that, the opportunity to pitch her genius against another’s: Kyashi isn’t stupid, by any means, but Mito just knows _so much_ and undoubtedly this noble Clan kid will too, and she’s still learning how to write.

It hadn’t been a relevant skill, in Rai no Kuni. Her adopted parents were caring, but they were both shinobi, and while they did their best to keep her fed and clothed and teach her how to survive, they barely had time for that much. Kyashi can hunt and mold chakra and can create new jutsus on the fly when necessary. She knows how to keep herself alive during the ferocious highland winters, and she’s had to learn how to use all types of elemental chakra, because it was either that or waste vitality on techniques that would never work, but…

She has no Clan. Mito is a princess and Tobirama might as well be one and she picks things up quickly but she isn’t a royal genius heiress with a million perfect skills and the kind of cosmopolitan know-how that lets you fake your way through any social interaction.

She isn’t like them, and that pulls at her heart so much she suddenly can’t bear to be in the same room as them, even though Mito clearly isn’t enjoying herself and the Senju boy is still not fully conscious.

Toro, her new warden, finds her perched on a rock jutting out of the northern-facing beach, knees pulled up to her chin and gaze fixed blankly on the horizon. It’s blasphemous to even think, she knows, but maybe if Mito wouldn’t come with her…maybe she should just go and try to find her way back to the small home she’d known, tucked into the cliffs overlooking the cloud forests. Maybe she’d be better off not forcing herself to internalize the endlessly confusing fūinjutsu that seems to come so naturally to literally _everyone else_ here.

“Whatever you’re thinking,” comes Toro’s sonorous voice out of absolutely _nowhere_ , causing Kyashi to jump a solid three feet into the air and land sprawled out on the sand, “stop it. Mito is only doing her duty as the heiress, and I’m certain that she would much rather be here with you, staring gloomily into nowhere and thinking such dark things that storm clouds form over your heads.”

Kyashi looks up, because there’s only a 50/50 chance that Toro is actually kidding, and sure enough the air around her is heavy and hot with moisture, and her white mop of curls is frizzy in the way that it only ever is before a thunderstorm. She could be useful, she reflects, if only as a weather radar. Her hair seems to have a better knowledge about the atmosphere than she does, which just really figures.

Toro settles beside her ward on the sand, pulling her gently into a proper seated position before slipping into the kind of pose that usually means she’s going to meditate. She doesn’t start, though, doesn’t close her eyes, only looks expectantly down at Kyashi until she does the same, crossing her legs beneath herself and folding her hands palms-down over her knees.

“You know,” says the Handmaiden, and Kyashi can already feel the ‘when I was your age’ about to come, “when I was your age—” Ah, there it is. “—shut up, brat, I’m trying to make a point. I’m not from Uzushio either, chicklet, and here I am today.” “On Uzushio. Physically traveling here doesn’t make a huge difference, Sensei.” “Wow, you’re mouthy. What I _meant_ was I had to overcome the same kinds of hurdles you’re struggling through now. I can almost see the gears in your head turning, driving you back north to the mainland, and I want to remind you that leaving now just because you feel like you should would be one of the stupidest decisions of your life. Which is very impressive, because you live with me and I know about _all_ of your stupid decisions, and there are so many—”

Kyashi sighs, not wanting to hear another word about what happened with the ramen and that replication seal and old man Eiji’s hellish flock of chickens, but Toro just stares at her some more with an unreadable expression and carries on regardless.

“Are you a commoner, living in the household of a noble family? Yes. Are you a foreigner on an island where everyone grew up together and knows each other by name? Yes. Do you look different and talk different and have different skills? Definitely. Do you know all of our customs and traditions and teachings? Not yet, you don’t. But that’s not an excuse for you to just _give up_ because everything is hard and you hate it and it feels like an impossible uphill battle. It _is_ an uphill battle, brat, and it is hard, and you won’t ever like it, but it’s not impossible and I don’t want you using any of your differences as an excuse, because that’s what makes you so important here. Princess Mito is a sheltered heiress and being so close to someone so different, who has led such a different life so far outside of what she knows? It’s good for her, great for her, probably, and it will make her more thoughtful and empathetic and considerate when she takes up her duty and has to serve as a diplomat and a Clan Head and a ruler and a thousand other things. There is no permanent state of being, but it’s easy to forget that, here, so far away from the wars and so isolated and peaceful. Uzushio _needs_ change to stay alive, which means it needs you to get your head out of your ass and stop second-guessing everything about yourself just because you’re not a redhead.”

Toro pauses, there, and breaks the eye contact she’d been holding with Kyashi for that entire speech before continuing.

“If you’re going to second-guess yourself, which you are because you’re a kid and also a human person, then do it because you could have better motives or more sound reasoning or a more intelligent approach to a problem. Criticize yourself because you need to know where you require improvement, not because you need the improvement in the first place. There is not a being on Earth who is perfect, chicklet, and holding yourself to those kinds of standards because you think it’s the only way to get yourself accepted in the eyes of folks who are not your precious people is the fastest, surest way to kill yourself.”

Kyashi doesn’t know if she’s breathing. Toro pulls out a kunai and begins lovingly cleaning it on her robes, not caring about the way it rips and stains the silk.

“Besides. The Senju boy is just a _boy_ , and Mito does have her head on straight. It’s not like he’s not going to have to face the same problems you do, too, hm? I’m certain he’ll be aiming for an apprenticeship here. You would likely do well to reach out to him: he doesn’t have a soulmate here to anchor him or a definitive future within the people, and he doesn’t know _any_  fūinjutsu at _all_.” There’s a delicate snort. “At least you can charge a seal lattice without making it explode in your face. You know that most of your peers won’t have that kind of chakra control until they’re teenagers? Feel bad for yourself if you will. I can’t just stop you. But for gods’ sake, girl, don’t let that keep you from being a competent woman, because somebody has to be, and Mito already has her hands full with that foolish fiancée of hers.”

Kyashi buries her face in her mentor’s side, getting snot all over her already-ruined clothes and startling the knife out of her hand. She muffles out a thanks into the rumbling shadow of Toro’s laughter, wipes off her face, and levels her breathing.

Who is she kidding? Hadn’t she been the one to tell Mito earlier that pretty much everyone she’s fated to deal with is a hot mess who needs help?

It’s with a light heart that she flickers back to the Uzumaki household to inform Tobirama that he will be training with her starting tomorrow, whether he likes it or not, and she can bully him into sense the way Toro-sama is so good at, and they’ll both be just fine.

  
ON THE BEACHES SURROUNDING THE ISLAND, UZUSHIO, WARRING CLANS ERA

ONE WEEK LATER

Akira is fairly shocked to witness the near seamless way Mito and Kyashi integrate the newcomer into their lives and turn their duo into a threesome. She’d expected a lot more roughhousing—well. There is plenty of roughhousing, more than is safe for the nicer things in her household, but it’s not mean-spirited or callous. Senju Tobirama is soaking up fūinjutsu like a sponge, and learning that Kyashi, too, was new to the subject had buoyed his attitude considerably. After all, no one likes to be left behind.

Akira does wish, however, that they didn’t get along _quite_ so well. It may be a case of the three of them being too similar, and they do argue near constantly, but they’re surprisingly coordinated for three kids, and terrifyingly creative.

Eiji Kōta has still not forgiven her for the defiling of his beloved birds, but it’s not like that’s the most troublesome thing they’ve gotten up to, and Senju wasn’t even there for that incident.

It’s almost frightening, watching such young children throw around such ingeniously powerful jutsus like handfuls of sand even as they throw handfuls of sand; Tobirama seems to be something of a prodigy with Suiton, which is _just great_ , because now Kyashi and Mito have their sole elemental weakness covered, and he’s teaching them how to shape the strongest Water Bullets she’s ever seen into _dragons_.

The boy is polite, clever, and delightful to talk to, as well as criminally adorable. He’s already got summons, which is nice because they’re always willing to babysit and horrifying because of what they consider to be babysitting. He’s also a bare centimeter away from getting himself run through on Kyashi’s yari like he’s so much dango and laughing like a tiny pale maniac when one of the smaller leopards bounces all over Mito and ruins the integrity of the flashbang seal she’d almost finished. When her wrath does not immediately dissipate with an apology, he washes Kyashi into the riptide with a quick hand sign – a very bad idea, considering the way she’s wreathed in lightning and perfectly familiar with the conductive properties of water – and shoos his summons off her lap, sitting down next to her and asking her something. Mito’s hackles smooth and she fixes her wind-tossed, salt-sprayed ponytail and then gestures rapidly at the now-destroyed seal, apparently pointing out what it was and how it was powered and explaining the delayed proximity-based timer she’d worked in that had frustrated her for weeks. Poor boy, Akira thinks fondly as he leans in with stars in his red eyes and clear hunger for knowledge on his face. Mito is perfectly willing to teach him what he wants to know, but Tobirama gets so sucked into learning that he completely loses all awareness of his surroundings, which is a horrible weakness for a sensor to have.

A weakness that Kyashi has become very familiar with over the past week and several foiled prankings.

Mito sees it coming, because of _course_ the two girls work in sync for this, and neatly hops out of the path of her soulmate’s latest fusion jutsu, a focused tornado of slicing wind and blinking lightning that Tobirama himself only barely manages to avoid with his head attached and the downy silver hair in front of his left ear three centimeters shorter.

The snow leopard purrs approvingly from its place in the sand, content to watch its summoner get the tar beaten out of him as long as he’s in no mortal danger, and Akira just shakes her head at the younglings. Everything they do is turned into a messy, competitive free-for-all, with Kyashi and Mito frequently pairing up to work Tobirama out of his shell and then catch him by surprise and him returning the favor when he regains his balance.

Akira smiles at them and leaves them in the capable talons of Chiyoko’s crocodiles and Tobirama’s leopards and goes back to her office to mow through the stacks of paperwork that have no doubt materialized there in the hour she’s been gone.

That evening, when the kits stumble back in all on top of each other and exhausted of both regular energy and chakra, her small family and the Handmaidens serve them a quiet, cozy dinner that they babble over and gesture around and inhale at the speed of light before making noises about being back before moonrise and rushing right outside again.

Toro smiles slyly, and Akira _knows_ that look and that her guard has undoubtedly had a hand in this – likely related to the surety Kyashi has recently found in herself as a person independent of Mito – and tries to suppress the growing migraine.

If Toro has taken it upon herself to play sensei with the brats, there is no question that the stormproofing seals will have to be refreshed, and the infrastructure reinforced. There are only three of them but they’re chaos enough already, unburdened by the many heavy weights of adulthood and bursting with youthful energy; Akira can only hope in vain that the Senju boy’s extended visit to Uzushio does not end in the destruction of the island altogether.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (to the tune of carrie underwood's "before he cheats") right nooow, 
> 
> nvm i cant make a clever joke about that like i thot i could....the point is i am NOT studying for my midterms. i think i already failed german + precalc anyway........ god said dumbass rights!!
> 
> but not madara. That Dumbass Gets No Rights
> 
> anyway idk how tf to write so even though i did make n actual legitimate outl*ne im still just hammering out whatever comes to mind cause sometimes it really do just be like that and this is not an english assignment which means im gonna put actual effort into it lmaoooooo sorry mrs volinsky. youre a real one but my brain is schoolphobic and proud
> 
> didnt entirely mean for there to be so many people falling into rivers but thats just how it happened i Guess...sink or swim i guess they never swim huh 
> 
> its easy to tell that i like posting but not coming up w words because ill write the notes before the chapters and everything turns out so much more different than planned agjhgjkfdhgjkhg
> 
> this is unfortunately long but. i allowed myself to narrate through the oc which means another 1K as penance for my hubris


	4. there's blood (in the water)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Earth Country is violently reintroduced to the geologic wonders of plate tectonics. The Yonbi is harrassed for being human-adjacent. Matatabi makes her grand debut and throws several fits from her mountain ranges that do not solve anyone's problems but do, in fact, create many problems for others. There is a discussion between siblings that does not, for once, end in bloodshed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lmaoooo alarming shifts in tone WHO?? this chapter features no humans that aren't brutally murdered bc bijuu are canonically humanphobic, which is ...... valid, honestly, considering what humans have done when left unchecked.......press F for the amazon rain forest :-(
> 
> also Matatabi is here now!!!! she uses female pronouns bc i said so..... i just randomly picked pronouns for the beasts based on my impressions of them and also cause theyre like gods so they really dont care about human binaries. they dont use 'it' because that's yknow, demeaning to a conscious creature, so any time a bijuu is referred to using it/its the narrator is a human
> 
> guess why zetsu uses it/its pronouns....... u get three chances and the first two dont count
> 
> when That finally happens, it takes tobes a frankly embarrassing amount of time to realize that 1) they have names that arent x-tails 2) he never bothered to ask for any of them 3) he doesnt know matatabis name or its pronouns and like.....yikes folks!
> 
> the first part of this had me stuck for like ten hours but then i played some minecraft and i was fixed, which Cannot Be A Coincidence. 20mineteen is real and it's healing

INTERLUDE – BENEATH THE SHADOWS OF THE GREAT STONE SPIRES, TSUCHI NO KUNI, WARRING CLANS ERA

The world is ending.

Heat shimmers heavy in the air, visibly warping what parts of the horizon aren’t obscured by steam and smoke. The overwhelming scent of brimstone and carbonized flesh is so dense as to be choking. 

The Gobi thrashes beneath chakra-reinforced ropes, screaming at an unholy pitch that shatters eardrums and glass.

With Uzushio’s adamant refusal to lend any kind of assistance in the matter of creating a bijuu seal, one particularly brave, unbelievably stupid lord from Earth Country has taken it upon himself to capture a Beast with or without any kind of fūinjutsu, consequences be damned; the squadron of shinobi hired to accompany him in this task are very quickly learning that the consequences are, indeed, damning.

The earth is packed harder than rock in some places and churned into soft, loamy soil in others – the rugged slopes of the Iwa mountains glow fire-hot through the shadows and the smog, superheated near to the point of melting by the battle throes of the Five-Tails. Floating shards of bedrock and plumes of toxic gas pollute alpine breezes that haven’t been anything but clear and cold for centuries, thrown up by the gigantic explosion radii of the bijūdama.

Lord Shōta is beginning to realize that he’s done the equivalent of throwing himself into the mouth of a volcano; his face has turned an ashy gray from the sudden weight of his decision. That, or the rock dust clogging the atmosphere.

The Gobi screeches in fury with the aborted rage of a stag caught in a bear trap and tries to wrench its broken foreleg from the massive, earth-shattering Doton it is clasped in, to no avail. It is surrounded on all sides by unseen numbers of _humans_ , tiny fragile mortals, but it has been ensnared and dishonored and _beaten_ , and it must know, instinctively, that no amount of apocalyptic tantrum-throwing will repair the fractured snap in its limb – certain death for any other horse, and still a dire injury in this one – because it lowers its head and snorts out an enormous cloud of steam that settles hot and heavy over the ground.

The Daimyō is cautiously calling his forces to a ceasefire, examining from a distance the titanic pale form of the Tailed Beast and where it is laid low at the foot of the mountain. This is a creature that can clear mountain ranges in a single leap with little more effort than it takes him to put on sandals, and that seems to be finally sinking in. 

It will not save him.

The gas masks all the men on this ill-fated expedition had brought with them are already well past capacity: they’ve worked, so far, keeping the soldiers breathing as the sky darkens with gas, but they are no defense against the sudden explosion of pyroclastic flow that comes thundering down the battered slopes, accompanied by – really, what else could they have been expecting.

The Four-Tails slams its giant flaming fists right into the convenient gathering of humans-turned-sacrifices with a roar that echoes like an earthquake. The ground that the Gobi had so considerately pre-heated for it begins to _melt_ as the temperature abruptly skyrockets and everything flammable within a five-mile radius sparks and burns. The defensive rage of the monkey king covers for its brethren as the Five-Tails finally pulls free its wounded leg and struggles back to its feet; there is still a splattering of open flesh injuries on its back and side, even with the healing potency of natural chakra working to disinfect and close them. It stays stationary for another twenty seconds or so - just long enough for it to get its bearing on its three healthy feet – before it flickers into fog and vanishes, gone like a ghost into the refuge of the volcanic peaks several miles to the south. It’s an environment far too inhospitable to support anything but the absolute hardiest of life, and as far as healing grounds go, it will suffice until the complications of a shattered leg are fully dealt with.

For now, though.

For now there is still the Yonbi, perched atop the ashes of a hundred well-charred _fools_ ; it was gracious enough to cremate them, even though they wounded its kin so gravely.

  
The same kindness will not be extended to the rest of this region’s people. Such hubris cannot be forgiven instantly and without reservation, and Son Goku has seen many things in his centuries of life, outlandish and outrageous alike, but _this_?

An all-out assault by _humans_ on a _bijuu_ , and one that would have very nearly succeeded if Kokuō hadn’t been so timely with their distress signal, and Son close enough to come to their aid?

Matatabi has reported massive wells of corrupted nature chakra simmering deep within the heart of her stormlands, hidden within the bowels of subterranean tunnels that lace like blood vessels beneath the surface. They’re far too small and intricate to be navigated by anything larger than an actual cat, let alone a creature like the Nibi – the Sage was the last person to see Matatabi’s kitten days, and she’s grown well past the height of Chōmei’s beloved heart-trees since then. She can’t properly examine the threat this may pose to her territory and potentially to the mainland; her temper is a terrible thing these days, granting Rai no Kuni its name a thousand times over and stripping the peaks of most everything with a pulse.

Matatabi refuses to discuss it, embarrassed and enraged by a fledgling threat of such gravity flourishing right beneath her prissy cat nose, helpless to confront it despite her awareness of its presence and her lioness’s share of the Juubi’s power.

She’ll have to get over it, thinks Son grimly, pummeling Iwa’s long-dormant fire-mountains back to life and carving new gorges that will draw the flow of lava far too close to what human settlements he finds. This land will not see snow for another hundred years, which is fantastic, since ice in any form is the dire enemy of any self-respecting heat yōkai and he will not ever understand the she-cat’s burning fascination for it.

  
Satisfied with a divine punishment well executed and a mighty blow struck against the concept of _cold_ , Son Goku returns to the soot-coated basalt temple where the Sage laid him to rest as an infant and drops into the mental plane the bijuu share.

He opens his eyes in the caustic steaming faultline frequented by himself and Kokuō, and while he does not see his sibling there he can sense their vitality, dull but steady – good, then. They’re resting and recovering, _as they should be_ after allowing themselves to be brought so shamefully low by those disgraceful hairless counterfeit apes that are descended somehow from Hagoromo.

Every day, grouses Son Goku. _Every single day_ he thinks about what an embarrassment the humans are to all self-respecting primates and tries not to hate his opposable thumbs for being so _useful_ , because apparently no other beast on Earth has managed to evolve them, which isn’t his fault. 

He’s still mocked by the other bijuu for his close resemblance to the mortals, and last time not even reminding Chōmei that she and hers were _literally spineless_ had freed him from the insults. Damn deformed butterfly, Son thinks unkindly, noting the lingering impression of sunlight-springwater-updraft that radiates from the beetle’s well-guarded forest sanctuary. They all have their places, here, since this exists beyond the Material Plane and bends so easily to their chakra and will, but it’s a travesty that not everyone has gone for magma as interior decoration. It’s heating and lighting and trash disposal _all in one_ , and who could get tired of just watching molten rock pop and shift and glow?

No one with sense, that’s who.

Apparently, mentally mentioning the devils will summon them from whatever they were doing, since Saiken and Isobu materialize out of nowhere and start harping on him for having bad taste, and that’s when Kurama slinks out of the shadows and barks at them for waking him up like the absolute bastard he is, and Son is goaded into a wrestling match that he himself absolutely did not instigate before he knows it.

After losing (which, _how._ Saiken is mostly liquid, to the point where they literally waste away near salt, and they _don’t have limbs_. They may have six tails, but Son Goku has his ever-useful thumbs and muscles and an actual skeleton, which should be more than enough to overpower a _slug_ in a physical fight, but apparently not), the gathered interlopers, now including Gyuuki and Shukaku, disperse with much jeering at the Yonbi for his embarrassing loss to the gentlest and squishiest of the bijuu and much congratulatory bubble-blowing with the Rokubi.

Son has gone back to his inner sanctum and is staring moodily into the lava, once again unfailingly reminded exactly _why_ none of the bijuu live too close to each other when That Bitch Matatabi sneaks in with an annoying excess of feline grace.

[ **Mnghb,** ] he greets her, which is about as vocal as he’s going to get unless she gives an actual reason for her to be invading someone else’s private space. She gives him a level stare, a strange effect when paired with her heterochromia, but makes herself right at home and proceeds to showcase her famed stealth and grace. 

[ **you know what happened to kokuo,** ] Matatabi says, odd-colored eyes narrowed in suspicion.

[ **So what if I do, wench,** ] Son replies, already tired of this conversation even though the only real reason he came here at all was to talk to the Nibi about the complete and utter leave humanity has collectively taken from all common sense.

[ **so what happened to kokuo.** ] snaps the Bakeneko, blue tails thrashing in annoyance. Son snorts, because she really isn’t going to get very far by showing off her measly two tails in a threat display, but her stare hardens from coal into black diamond and he quiets. She must have something to say too, but she’s probably waiting for him to take whatever vocal bait she’s set so she can feel better than him.

[ **They were attacked. By humans. They seemed to be trying to capture them, but they haven’t told me anything about it and they’re going into a healing sleep. Why do you need to know? It’s not like you couldn’t have found that out yourself.** ]

Matatabi stills in a show of deceptive calmness. Her coat of flames is burning high and bright the way it does when her rare temper rears its head, and the strength of her burning-freezing aura is even headier than the contrast usually makes it. 

[ **i believe,** ] she rumbles in a soft, low tone, [ **that we are being hunted. i dont know why. i dont know by whom. but i do know that there is something festering in my territory that i cannot reach and cannot understand.** ]

Son pauses from where he’d been climbing into one of his lava pools for a soak. It’s an awkward position, the strength of his prehensile tails mostly keeping him from falling in face-first, but an unknown foe that can give Matatabi the slip and still keep going? 

[ **…Is there any need of assistance.** ]

[ **not yet. i get the feeling that bringing in another bijuu would end very poorly and im not going to charge in preemptively when the only thing i know is that i dont know anything.** ]

[ **You’re warning us?** ] Dangling upside down from the ceiling above his magma pools, Son is scorched more by the venomous glare he receives from his sister - admirably ferocious, considering how ridiculous she looks from this angle - than by the radiating heat. Matatabi always has been so good at staring others into submission; to witness her actually communicating is unusual, to say the least, and bodes poorly for the future.

[ **curiosity killed the cat, son. you are many things but subtle and clever are not among them. keep to yourself, youve caused enough of a scene already and i dont believe whatever this is can be fixed by a strong enough punch.** ]

Preposterous, thinks Son.

[ **That’s preposterous, tabs. A strong punch can solve all problems.** ]

The sheer vitriol of the look he gets because of that is enough to keep him from commenting on the odd potency of the worry in Matatabi’s aura. She is almost always unruffled and unbothered, her true emotions hidden unless she chooses to reveal them. Either she is so disturbed by the notion of an unknown evil hiding under her paws that she has lost control of herself or worse, she just doesn't care enough to hide how gravely she thinks of her issue.

Unbidden, memories of the Sage, old and wizened and rubbing at the stubby horns on his head come to mind. _There are many horrors in the world,_ he’d told them all, once upon a time in an age long lost. _Do not let yourself be consumed by them, children_.

Son Goku threads his hands together and gives his sister a considering glance. There’s a stiff tension in every line of her lithe form, and her paws are too still against the basalt flooring. 

[ **Alright,** ] he says after a while. [ **But don’t get yourself snatched by—by some mutant tunnel goblin, or any humans. That would be embarrassing and the rest of us would have to disown you.** ]

Matatabi doesn’t say anything in response, but the stress she’d been carrying in her shoulders bleeds out and her tails resume their idle swaying motion. She dips her head in gratefulness, letting him have the last word – that really speaks louder than whatever else she could hope to lecture him about - before she rises to her paws and melts into a haze of silver mist.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i dont want to say updates will always be this frequent cause the past week has been three-hour early dismissals and im blowing off so much homework right now like. So Much, but there can be hope cause i will continue to have homework to blow off in the future and theres no better, less productive way to do that than naruto fanfic except maybe playing minecraft. guess which bitch got seven diamonds? Its This Bitch
> 
> this one's a little shorter but i already butchered their characters enough so well pick up next chap w/ a time skip and some more ocs lmao


	5. the price of your greed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zetsu engages with a shinobi's worst enemy. Mito is upset about her wedding, and Kyashi has a job to do, but refuses to do it. Izuna copes with Baby's First Rivalry and Tobirama goes head-first into a river, again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1000 HITS,,,,,,,,, WE DID IT KIDS!!!
> 
> it's real hyped but. im tired and sad rn so ill update the notes later in case anyone missed the usual rambles and nonsense
> 
> UPDATE: 1) im a teenager whos almost an adult and so are most of the main characters here - with the exception of maybe toka, who is 23 as of this chapter, everyone is between 17-20 thanks to the time skip, and some of them are/will be in relationships, committed/monogamous or not, and be sexually active. again, I Am 17, and sometimes ..... teenagers FUCK, so im not going to add an underage sex tag unless someone specifically requests it  
> 2) zetsu has no rights and will not be given any. im 100% right about this and will not be accepting criticism. Plants Dont Deserve Citizenship  
> 3) ik theres something else i should say but im doing a fantastic job of forgetting that entirely so f lmao  
> 4) ohhhhh yeahhhhhhhh...were getting into the big part, lads, the whole Plott with maybe some Devices and perhaps even an Action Scene or two. i think ill update the warnings bc despite the big fluff big happiness big little-kid vibe of this fic so far this is a fucken uhhh war zone and most of the next bit will happen against the narrators' will, and itll be violent and dehumanizing and include some torture but not much and also some mind control if my planning decides to be followed so. theres that  
> 5) my mom knows about this now. thankfully nothing more than 'its a fanfic i am writing currently' but she is aware of it and has incorporated it into several small speeches about my work ethic, which is an absolute Nightmare and i regret literally every decision ive ever made

AT THE EMPEROR’S OCEANSIDE STRONGHOLD, MIZU NO KUNI, WARRING CLANS ERA

ONE DECADE LATER

 

The Zetsu takes its usual perch in the emptied head of Minamoto Daimaru as soon as the Emperor calls his court to order. The assembled daimyo and Clan Heads slowly quiet, with much content; the Emperor has had no true power since the Empire itself dissolved centuries ago, plunging the continent into constant conflict that has yet to see a solution or even a pause.

From inside the corpse of the Shogun, Zetsu barely manages to restrain from rubbing its hands together in delight; wearing a body means that others can see its actions, now, so it has to be more careful than usual.

It notes Uchiha Azuki, chosen representative of his Clan and one of perhaps three shinobi present, watching the proceedings with blank, glassy eyes, and once again has to suppress a gleeful reaction; stealing the boy’s Mangekyō had been just as much trouble as it was worth, and now it has a dōjutsu that can evolve into the Rinnegan _and_ the Clan Head’s bastard child as its puppet.

The only thing it really needs now is the firepower to bring its plans to fruition.

Minamoto is famed for his silent stoicism and taciturn manner; all Zetsu has to do when wearing his body to meetings like these is make sure it gets there on time, which it always does. It wouldn’t do for the Shogun to be late, after all, not when he’s been the one pulling all of the political strings here for over fifteen years; it was truly a stroke of luck to find this man and yet another to discover that he was a _civilian_ and thus had no possible hope of fighting Zetsu’s parasitic invasion of his nervous system. One manipulative bastard isn’t really all that different from another, when push comes to shove, and the people here are long used to the foremost martial lord of this era acting like a marionette with cut strings when he’s not doing something.

The man _had_ been a powermonger with dreams of world domination; really, all Zetsu is doing is just…taking his aspirations to a new level. Mother would be proud, it thinks, practically salivating at the way one of the Earth Country daimyos – one of the few to have survived that catastrophic attempt at the Gobi’s capture so many years back, and a saving grace for his remaining people – gets into an argument with the Head of a samurai Clan, snapping something about disaster relief and public safety.

The Kokuō incident was regretful in that it’s taken ten full years of dealing with the fallout for people to stop flinching at every mention of the bijuu, but a resounding success in that it proved conclusively that humans certainly are capable of fighting and winning against Tailed Beasts, so long as they don’t have backup. Zetsu curses silently at Son Goku, and its own poor planning; the Five-Tails has long since gone into hiding, nigh undetectable even by their own siblings, and the rest of them have gotten far, far warier; the Lightning Country mountains where Zetsu has planted its roots are famous now for the deadly storms the Nibi triggers in the hopes of flushing it out, or something to that effect. 

Matatabi is onto it, it knows, but there’s not a single damn thing she or her Sage could hope to do about it, and that’s such a viscerally pleasing thought that it actually breaks out into giggles, interrupting whatever fight had been going on and blanketing the room in a heavy silence.  
  
Everyone except the Uchiha is staring, Zetsu realizes, but that’s alright – it was about to speak up anyway, and now it doesn’t have to bother getting anyone’s attention.

“Hnn. So silly,” it says, “that We know now that We truly can take on the bijuu, and that We do nothing to take advantage of this fact.” 

The Earth daimyo pales dramatically and actually stands up, hands clenched into fists and entire form wavering subtly. 

“My lord,” he says, teeth gritted and jaw set, “my homeland is still enduring the repercussions of my predecessor’s decision to pursue the Gobi. We defeated it, yes, but we _paid for that victory_ and didn’t come home with anything to show for it beyond ashes. There is no way, _no way_ to stand up to the Beasts, and I implore You to please put whatever fascination it is you have with them well behind You. For the sake of humanity’s continued survival, leave the monsters well alone; You do not have need of them to take control of whatever You like." 

A pretty enough speech, Zetsu supposes, flooding Minamoto’s eyes with its chakra and turning them a harsh, eerie yellow. It has received some kind of petition like this every single time it brought up the bijuu in the past, to no surprise; it seems that some people, at least, are still holding onto enough common sense to know just what a bad idea even considering their capture is.

Not enough common sense, however, to know that Zetsu is fully aware of this and has been since the beginning. It is, in fact, counting on their sheer destructive power to bring its mother back to this world.

The atmosphere stills. Several samurai reach beneath their lacquered armor and layered robes for weapons, but Zetsu’s most disturbing smile freezes them in their tracks. Uchiha stares with hollow eyes at the wall opposite of him, beginning to drool a little; an unfortunate symptom of brainwashing that leaves him comatose when not possessed by Zetsu or one of its new plant-clones, but one that cannot be helped for now.

“We know what We desire,” it croons, delighting in the heady scent of the fear radiating from nearly every person in the room. The Emperor himself looks like he’s two seconds away from realizing that his office has been utterly useless for centuries. “We also know that with Our resources, there are only so many things that could stand in Our way, and no obstacle is insurmountable when faced with Our willpower. There are a few things We still need, a few more pieces that have to be moved properly into place, but it will not be long before We have in Our hands the might of the bijuu and are able to use it to manifest Our will. Our bidding will be followed.”

Zetsu stops to stare down at the lords in attendance, relishing in their quiet despair – it’s a little late for them to realize that they have no choice in following its demands, and a little addicting to roll in the sensation of their horrified resignation.

“Are any of the fine lords in Our presence unwilling to see Our dreams realized?”

A few men look like they might stand up and protest, but Zetsu continues before they can do anything.

“Were anyone to stand in Our way, they should do so recognizing what consequences will befall those who disobey and defy Us and be content in knowing that they damn their people with such blatant displays of insubordination. We will reward those who support Us and lend Us their resources with paradise when Our world is made reality. We only ask for your cooperation in this matter, noble audience, and that you do not interfere with Our efforts for global peace.” 

Zetsu’s plant-clones materialize from their hiding places in the rafters, startling shouts and drawn weapons from the gathered authorities before everyone present is unconscious in under a minute thanks to the haze of chakra the clones are carefully weaving into the air.

  
When they wake, they will forget this meeting and what happened here; it will not matter. Zetsu will have their cooperation or it will have their heads, and the only reason they’re all still alive is because it has greater need of their resources than their flesh. 

That may not hold true if they don’t realize soon that their futures are with Kaguya and act accordingly.

 

 

UZUMAKI CLAN COMPOUND, UZUSHIO, WARRING CLANS ERA 

A FEW WEEKS LATER

 

Kyashi is sprawled spread-eagle on Mito’s futon, face buried in the sheets and limbs dripping over the sides. Mito herself is seated at her desk a few feet away, putting the finishing touches on some freight scrolls and then turning to the unreasonably massive pile of assorted gear that she’s deemed to be appropriate for this mission.

She’s halfway through storing three ( _three_! Kyashi hasn’t needed more than one spear since she was ten and finally finished making her own) backup yari into the small gray scroll containing the rest of Kyashi’s various weapons when she’s interrupted by what sounds like a dying whale.

“What,” snaps Mito, placing the weapons scroll neatly next to the rest of them before stomping over to her futon and throwing her body weight onto her soulmate’s back. 

“MNGHGN,” Kyashi groans into a pillow. “MEETS GET OFF. I’m trying to have a crisis and you’re packing for me like I’m gonna be gone for months instead of a week, tops.” 

Mito smooths a hand through her long red hair – it’s been left loose today, and will no doubt be horribly snarled by nighttime – and sighs delicately through her nose.

“It’s a mission with no clear adjective requesting you specifically for no actual reason and requiring you to head alone deep into the mainland where _anything_ could happen to you – stop _squirming_ , that won’t make your back hurt any less, and it’s not like you do the stretches that are actually supposed to help with your scoliosis. I have every right to force you into so many coats you can barely move and etch protection seals on the inside of all your armor.”

“Maybe,” says Kyashi, voice muffled from where she’s still face-planted into the bed and valiantly trying to wiggle her way out from under the princess, “my spine wouldn’t hurt so much if you’d stop _sitting on it_ whenever you try to immobilize me. It’s not even effective, I can still move; watch this.”

She thrashes around in the sheets, looking an awful lot like an earthworm poking its head out of the dirt and proving once and for all that puberty did not grace her with the calm, collected demeanor Akira had been so hoping she’d grow into. 

Mito graciously ignores this and examines a shirt, sleeveless and high-necked, before folding it around some bicep-length seal-coated gloves and setting it into another section of the storage seals.

Kyashi waits a few more minutes to give the illusion that she’s forfeited before flashing out from underneath Mito to the sound of undignified yelling and shoving nearly every piece of ninja-grade gear she owns into the scrolls as quickly and messily as she can.

“It’s anonymous, yeah, but so are most missions, Meets,” she reminds her soulmate, who is gathering her kimono around her with a disgruntled glare. “It’s not like I haven’t done this kind of thing before, and it’s late June anyway. Senju will probably be back for the summer while I’m gone, and I promise I won’t tell on you if you beat him up.”

Mito’s expression gentles a little; Tobirama’s annual visits to Uzushio last all summer long and have been tradition since he overstayed his first time, and he spends the weeks sparring with them and absorbing more jutsus and napping in the sunlight with his leopards and then grouching about his sunburns. It’s a nostalgic time for all of them, and not even the first time someone has been absent for a bit, so there’s no reason for Mito to be as concerned as she is.

Kyashi herself has a bad feeling about this mission, but her destination _is_ in Lightning Country, only a few hours away from where she lived so long ago, which is enough of a reason to justify the nausea and longing churning in equal parts in the pit of her stomach. 

Mito is still upset, but she is ever reasonable in the face of a good argument, and she just makes Kyashi agree to send a summons every time something significant happens, which is kind of a weird stipulation but worth it if it puts her mind at ease – such a difficult thing to do these days, now that her marriage to Hashirama is only a few months away and her beloved mother is getting so much older.

Neither of them have actually _seen_ Hashirama since they were first introduced ten years ago, but they have it on Tobirama’s dubious authority that he is ‘a too-cheerful oversized bastard who will turn into a tree one day and then _I’ll_ have to be Clan Head, so if you murder him on your wedding night I can help you hide the body,’ which is…something, not the least because Hashirama’s death in any form will still make his little brother the next heir.  Mito was insulted at the implication that she was incompetent enough at assassination to require _help_ with corpse disposal, and that comment had resulted in Senju walking around with lemon-yellow hair for a few days. 

Akira-hime walks into Mito’s bedroom, then, and leans onto the sword she’s taken to using as mobility assistance, smiling softly at them from the doorway.

“Mito,” she says, her voice raspier than it used to be but still clear and strong, “it won’t be a long mission, and you still have to plan for _your_ move. You’ll be returning to the Senju with Tobira-chan when the fall comes, and you can’t just stuff your entire room into cargo scrolls. What progress have you made on the seals you’ll use to protect your new home?”

Mito frowns at the mention of the fūinjutsu she’s crafting to make her and Hashirama’s married home truly _theirs_ ; since Hashirama himself has no real talent with the art, he’s apparently just going to _make the house_ , which Kyashi supposes is a good enough way to start your new family. Maybe.

There hasn’t been a whole lot of discussion about what will happen to her when Mito marries, but she’s not going to accept anything less than master bedroom privileges – she’s been sleeping in the same bed as her soulmate since they met, and she hopes the Senju heir is smart enough to just accept that, since he definitely won’t appreciate what she’ll do to him if he doesn’t. 

That’s probably another thing they should talk about, but if they don’t get around to it, Kyashi has absolutely no problems with just…moving into and living in a house that technically isn’t hers. Hashirama is only Mito’s _second_ wife, after all, and he’ll do well to remember that, burgeoning God of Shinobi or not.

Mito makes a face. She’s a perfectionist, and hasn’t ever seen the famed Mokuton, and she’s not sure how a structure made from it will interact with her seals, so she’s got a bunch of creative concepts and drafts but no actual finished product, and likely won’t until she can actually get her hands on the building – there’s no telling what could go wrong, forcing two entirely different types of chakrawork to mesh together without any adjustments.

That would probably be a nice metaphor for relationships in general if Kyashi wasn’t morally opposed to rhetorical devices in general. Too bad, she thinks. That might have been a nice thing to say at the ceremony.

She takes the assorted cargo scrolls from Mito, who has packed into them a truly ridiculous amount of stuff, including dozens of different miniature seal slips that can be used as anything from grenades to … very big, very fancy grenades, and probably some other things too, but mostly explosions.

Kyashi is reluctantly impressed with the thoroughness of Mito’s armament, and changes into her mission clothes as soon as Akira leaves. Mito is too busy muttering under her breath and fiddling with notes Tobirama had sent her on his developing Hiraishin – still very much a work in progress, since he hasn’t figured out how to control his teleportation and actually do it without immediately killing himself of chakra exhaustion – to blush at Kyashi’s bare legs, which is nice because they’re _seventeen_ and have been dating for almost a _decade_ and she’s already very well acquainted with how well her head fits between them. They’re kind of past the blushing and fainting point, but Mito sometimes clings to her royal habits when she gets embarrassed, which is endlessly funny.

Once she’s done strapping on her armor – sleek and engraved with a net of seals that glitters under the light and fits against her like a glove, unlike that plated _mess_ the Senju consider to be appropriate protection – she rolls shut the scrolls, fits them into their harnesses, and goes out onto the porch to shove her sock-wrapped feet into her boots. Sandals may be more practical in the hot mugginess of Uzushio, where foot fungus is a very real danger to anyone so green as to wear close-toed shoes, but that will not be the case for the highlands of Rai no Kuni, where the very real dangers include frostbite, hypothermia, and falling to one’s death off a sheer cliff face.

Steel-toed boots with rough, spiked treads it is. Kyashi loves these boots, even though she rarely gets the chance to wear them; there’s no shoe like them for stomping around dramatically, though, and she kicks at the red brick beneath her feet for good measure. There’s a satisfying _thud_ , and then no more delaying. 

Except for Mito, who is mostly hidden behind the half-closed shoji door and trying to pretend that the paper is successfully concealing her. The tension in every line of her body is mostly unfamiliar, and a sad sight to see. Mito should never have to be seriously distressed. 

She must really hate this. It’s honestly not that long of a mission – they’ve been separated for months on end before and it sucked but they did it – and despite Kyashi’s own sense of unwarranted danger and the alarmed ringing of her fine-honed survival instincts, there really isn’t that much to it. Nothing more than an assassination, and not even a hard one. 

Mito stares at her with conflicted violet eyes and she motions for her to come out. When she’s standing on the brick tiling of the Uzumaki compound, eyes level with Kyashi’s, she does nothing but wrap her in a hug so achingly tight that her ribcage creaks under the pressure and her sides feel like they might be bruising even through the armor.

“Meets,” Kyashi grunts, inches off the ground and near breathless, “it’s gonna be okay. I promise to come back early and complain about how boring and uneventful it was and then lounge on the floor until you kick me back to my feet. I’ll keep Diligence by me the _entire time_ —”

Mito pulls back and sets her down, which is mildly disappointing, but she looks like she’s expecting a follow-up on that promise, so Kyashi sighs and summons one-seventh of her Virtues. 

Diligence materializes out of nowhere, unaccompanied by any special effects, and peers up at Mito from where xe has perched right on Kyashi’s shoulder, and xe are _way too big_ to be pulling that nonsense, _how can birds be so heavy._

Xir red-and-gold glare meets Mito’s evenly, and xe dips xir head in a show of respect. “I promise,” xe says, their voice rumbly from disuse, “we will strive on regardless of any obstacles, Mito-hime. Kyashi-sama cannot fail and will not give up with me at her side, watching for her enemies, and you have no reason to believe we will not return hale and whole as we always do.” Xe shuffles xir six giant wings, thwacking xir summoner in the head with a gross lack of veneration, and only stops xir posturing when Mito dips her head in reluctant acceptance.

“Do your job, then, and begone,” she commands, voice steady. “You have better things to do than sit around here all day, _slothing_ away time you should be spending working.”

At the deliberate mention of xir bitterest enemy, Diligence promptly _loses xir shit_ and yanks Kyashi with xem into the air before just dropping her back on the ground so xe can safely throw a minor temper tantrum at the horrific implication that xe is being _lazy_.

“What a fantastic start,” Kyashi says, once again collapsed on her stomach. Mito just snickers at her and then flickers away into the house, leaving her sprawled alone on the brickwork with her summons having a fit and her yari digging into her arm.

There is no possible way this could go poorly.

  

NEUTRAL TERRITORY, HI NO KUNI, WARRING CLANS ERA

NOT MUCH LATER

 

This is going so, so poorly, thinks Izuna, snarling as the white Senju demon dodges yet another fireball and then flickers into nothingness, probably to murder Izuna and then eat babies and gloat about it or something.

That seems like something Tobirama would enjoy doing, based on Izuna’s knowledge of him, which amounts to: ninja, albino, bastard, horrible, alright with a sword, uses Suiton jutsus like a douchebag, is a douchebag, makes too many weasel jokes.

All very objective observations, of course. As an Uchiha, Izuna and his Sharingan see all and record it perfectly, which means he’s never going to forget the _enormous fucking dragon_ that materializes out of _absolutely nowhere_ and nearly bites him in half with fangs made of water. 

He dodges it neatly and elegantly with no stumbling or flailing whatsoever, which conveniently puts him several yards closer to Madara, who is screaming like a madman about something while hacking at a maple tree that hadn’t been there five minutes ago. He’s squared off against Hashirama, who is yelling and…crying? His voice is _loud_ , which means his wailing about peace is clearly audible even over the din of battle, and _ahhh shit_.

Izuna leaps out of the path of a Fuuton that goes whirling an inch above his head and manages not to get his ponytail cut off. He spits a wall of blue fire behind him, hoping that will be enough to deter the younger Senju brother for a moment, and rushes towards his aniki. 

Madara sees him coming, thankfully, because he draws back his fan before it can bisect him and curses loudly. Hashirama yelps – is he _surprised?_ – and with a fling of his hand creates a massive redwood that catches Madara in its boughs as it explodes from the ground. He then hops onto a branch as it passes, the tree still going, and his voice drifts down from above – he seems to be trying to convince aniki that peace is a good idea.

Madara responds to that with a giant tongue of blue-white flame that turns the canopy of the tree into ash and charcoal. 

Izuna gets a moment to digest that before there’s steel whistling through the air and he’s forced to reengage Tobirama, who seems similarly distracted by the absolute spectacle his brother is making of himself and slips up enough for Izuna to embed a kunai in the meat of his thigh. 

Before he can be put down properly, though, he puts his hands together and _disappears_ in a flash of golden light, gone from Izuna’s field of vision like the inconsiderate asshole he is and quickly replaced by one of his clansmen, a kunoichi he vaguely recognizes who—

\--who is his soulmate? 

She stares down at him, not bothering to move – he’s trapped pretty thoroughly beneath the blade of her naginata and doesn’t really want to be gutted, not when he’s just _found his soulmate_. The background clamor of combat and the other ambient noises just…fade, and Izuna makes eye contact with the Senju woman, who’s staring at him with a fish-like gape contorting her lovely face. 

He feels like the worst of the worst to do it, the most despicable, scummiest human being on the planet, but the Tsukuyomi effectively paralyzes her and he wriggles himself free just as Tobirama reappears, leg bandaged and splinted and scowl firmly in place, and at the same time Madara finishes burning the redwood tree to the ground, hollering at Hashirama about **_PEACE_**. 

Everything promptly goes to hell. 

Tobirama drags the kunoichi off Izuna, awkwardly handling her, her weapons, and his own at the same time, giving Izuna the most venomous glare he’s received in a while. His hands are too full for hand signs, so he just body flickers a few yards away and sets her gently on the ground before doing _something_ with his hands and her face.

Madara screams in rage at something and decapitates some poor nin who had been about to take advantage of Izuna’s position prone on the ground before screaming in rage at his little brother and hauling him back up to his feet. The physical contact, though, seems to reawaken Madara’s sensor skills – he suppresses them in most battles, the ambient chakra flying around too distracting and painful to bother paying attention to - and he boggles at his little brother, noting the shifts in his coils that must indicate the formation of his Bond. He’s still staring over at the Senju kunoichi, though, looking like a deer in front of a Susanoo and _drooling_ , which, _gross._  

Hashirama springs to his feet from where he’d been briefly winded by the fall and looks as though he can’t decide whether to approach Madara now that he’s not fully in murder mode anymore or run to the side of his brother and the woman.

He opts for the second, yelling out “TŌKA!” as he goes towards his family, and Izuna is so delighted that he finally knows her name possibly that he doesn’t stop to stab Tobirama for looking at his brother like that.  
  
Madara just drops him clean on the ground, then, storming over in Hashirama’s footsteps and nearly breathing fire with how angry he is at just being abandoned like that, and almost gets a good blow in with his gunbai before Hashirama traps him in _another_ tree, which is just getting tired at this point.

Izuna stumbles back to his feet and scrambles vaguely after him, shell-shocked about the entire thing and doing his best to avoid being murdered as he goes, and way too absorbed in his own head. He just makes it close enough to see the woman’s – _Tōka’s_ – face, before Tobirama once again proves himself to be literally the worst person in the world as he yanks on Izuna’s ponytail and does the flashy new jutsu.

 

The world stills and Izuna and his rival are at the Nakano, standing knee-deep in water with the Senju maintaining his awkward hold on his hair. There’s half a second of wrestling before he finds himself sinking into the depths with a squirming albino trying to kick him in the stomach. This fight is no less vicious than the one they’d been in not two minutes earlier, but it is less deadly, for all that they’re submerged and possibly drowning – Tobirama seems to be drained of chakra entirely, since he isn’t even attempting a Suiton, and Izuna is thrown enough from the very eventful recent past to be dangerously off his guard.

They both make it back to shore, hacking and coughing, before collapsing side-by-side on the sand and just staring up at the rising moon.

“I hate you,” snaps Tobirama in between gulping breaths of air, “ _so fucking much_. You know you just _tortured_ my cousin, right? Your _soulmate?_ Tōka is literally going to kill you for that no matter who you are, and I won’t even stop her. I’m quitting pest control, if she wants to put down rats then she’s more than welcome to.”

“Your cousin!” breathes Izuna, starstruck and bleeding and mildly concussed. “Holy shit! Your cousin is my soulmate!”

That earns him a wordless snarl from the Senju and some muffled grumbling he can’t quite make out – likely cursing him for having the gall to be Bonded to one of his own. Izuna shuffles upright with much effort; he, too, is exhausted, having returned from a mission last night and barely having enough chakra to be battle-ready. Tobirama is sprawled on his back, hands pressed over his face and armor coming unbuckled. His white fur collar is sodden and likely very uncomfortable – good, the bastard deserves it.

“Don’t worry, though,” Izuna continues, enjoying the opportunity to mock his rival without having to worry about getting stabbed if he’s too slow, “I’ll only let _you_ kill me, as long as you only let _me_ kill _you_. That is how rivalries work, isn’t it, you stupid Senju?”

Tobirama does not remove his hands from his face, probably hiding his shame from the world like the coward he is.

“I’ll let _anyone_ kill me at this point, I am so fucking tired of this. Please, just. Do me a favor, Uchiha, and stop existing so I can go home and _sleep_.”

Izuna snickers a little at that, kind of wounded that Senju doesn’t seem to be a faithful rival but not that hurt. He is just a Senju, after all. He fishes a kunai out of his pants – apparently the only one to have survived his swim – and idly traces the blade along the scratched surface of Tobirama’s deep blue chestplate.

“Nah,” he hums, thinking about Senju Tōka and what her thighs had felt like around his neck. “I’ve got better things to do, man. I gotta let my brother know I have to marry a Senju and then I have to get pegged by your cousin—”

He doesn’t finish the taunt, because Tobirama finally puts his hands to use and brings the Nakano crashing down on the both of them with the force of a waterfall.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the uzushio marriage tradition comes from before you by theformerone it's real good and yall should check it out
> 
> actually a lot of things inspired this fic........there's some big influence from Of Harrowed Hearts by sable_scribe, an amazing uhh work of ART that features kurama the big red dog and baby naruto, as well as mentally-healthy-and-well-adjusted!sasuke, which is just a pleasure to read always...theyre little overpowered motherfucjers with good coping mechanisms and there's a lot of background info there on chakra in general and sealwork especially and some real good history on uzushio. orochimaru gets his ass beat seven ways to sunday whihc is nice
> 
> if anybody wants to kno more about my ocs which absolutely nobody does then kyashi's summons take the form of bearded vultures and rarely some other birds with....some alterations  
> her primary summons, the ones she uses almost exclusively, are the seven heavenly virtues given physical form - i headcanon that most of the yokai/gods/assorted supernatural beings tend to settle on taking at least one standard form when they do go to the material plane, and celestial bodies are all birds of some sort (sometimes with extra eyes or tails or wings, plumage w special properties and colors and that shit, but still recognizable as one of their chosen species). they do change between bird-forms when it suits them or whenever they have a need to for some reason, but its not wholly shapeshifting or hengeing - they keep all their special traits, like kitsune who take on human form. so if, for some reason, diligence decided that the feathers of a vulture did not suit xem anymore, xe would just molt them off and then become idk an ostrich or likely an albatross
> 
> (side note. ive assigned birdkin to all the sins, virtues, archangels, and horsemen. wrath is a swan. death is a condor, cause fuck yeah detritivores and some kind of metafor w/ being spiritual bridges between the living and the dead! maybe i should make another like side doc and put it in a series with this one so i can stop making the notes so damn long)
> 
> lmaoooo my parents are lutheran so i do know Some things abt christianity + its canon (theology?? who knows) or at least enough to feel comfortable writing about it. i also take world history so i know that when it was finally introduced in japan by europeans (after they began to fuck literally the whole world up) it was accepted as new and spicy for a while cause there were many wars going on and they needed something new and spicy. once the shogun united japan into one state though christians were like executed and stuff  
> anyway i dont really want to go too deep into religion cause i personally am an atheist and i find it kinda boring to read abt (no offense to anyone i have a very..... Very narrow lens that includes nardo and girls and now this) and also i dont want to have to do actual research which is considered a war crime by all the juniors i know especially with the brand new whole ass assignment we just got.....


	6. is your son (and your daughter)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hashirama sulks around a garden and meets his bride. Mito is upset, and Tobirama is revealed to be just as sarcastic if a little more cuddly underneath his cold, cruel exterior. Madara valiantly tries to protect his little brother's dubious virtue and goes to court, and both of those actions have some questionable repercussions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ok so some warnings! mild eye gore (not really any eyes, but that's kinda the problem lmao), definitely a lot of murder, izuna being unashamedly horny on main when he really, really shouldnt be, and just some unhappiness in general
> 
> it's hashirama's turn on the brain cell but even without it he'll never forget to drink his twice-daily dose of Respect Women Juice, cause thats the kind of person he is...... mito is Byesexual but not reeeaaaally poly so she'll have like. a spouse w/ benefits/casual dating relationship w hashi and Ride Or Die Wife Forever w kyashi. hashirama does have a soulmate cause the power of gay love will Prevail but he also loves mito like. That and its gonna show.....senju clan heir found chugging his stan uzumaki mito juice, Just Like Me
> 
> madara's main problem in this fic and in canon is that he's just a dumbass. genius ninja shinobi clan head wahtever lmao Blah Blah Blah................his whole arc is just one big idiot plot. like hes not legitimately stupid but he is young and impulsive and absolutely refuses to think things through before he does them cause hes never used his brain in his life and its always turned out sort of ok for him. like. if he'd gone 2 therapy and calmed down a bit and actually thought for once in his life the whole tsuki no me nonsense would have never happened. hashirama too lmao..... theyre the two stooges. im allowed to project my negative traits onto anything i damn well wish cause this is My World Now so boom. madara has literally no brain-to-mouth filter and is also allergic to forethought
> 
> fortunately since im a lesbian and actually have good taste people will use their brains or be ruthlessly beat with the common sense stick until they do. mito meets madara and holy shit lmao that goes Inch Resting Lee.....
> 
> hashirama kinfirmed as totoro.........the senju clan compound is loosely based off of nijō castle, which is a gorgeous old giant as fuck palace in kyoto that definitely Seems big enough to house at least the main families of a noble clan, soooooo....anyway japanese architecture is literally the most amazing thing you cant change my mind. i see a mon and i go hog fucking Wilde baby like YEAH
> 
> bonus points to anyone who caught my Extremely Sneaky Ninja-Like Subtle Tiny Nearly-Invisible Hints that something would go wrong on kyashi's mission where absolutely NOTHING could POSSIBLY go wrong.....yall get another chapter as a present

SENJU CLAN COMPOUND, HI NO KUNI, WARRING CLANS ERA

JUST BEFORE THE AUTUMNAL EQUINOX

 

Hashirama is pacing the garden like a caged beast, tugging at his oversized sleeves and fretting like the hen he is. Tōka is seated near the koi pond, coolly reading something that’s either a mission report or a cheap romance novel. She seems to be rather cheerfully ignoring him. (He secretly suspects that the discovery of her soulmate – _Uchiha Izuna_ , and isn’t that just _wonderful_ – has softened her up a bit, but if he admitted to that she’d skin him and then who knows what might happen for peace! Madara has so far refused to even _hear_ of any Senju getting within 50 meters of his beloved brother, despite Hashirama pleading shamelessly for the contrary, and seems to have conveniently forgotten that said brother regularly risks a violent, messy death via physical contact with Tobirama.) The plants, however, are not so hardy under the turbulent anxiety of Hashirama’s dense chakra; the maple trees shiver and seem to draw their boughs in closer.

Tobirama is supposed to arrive today, Mito as his accompaniment. This would not ordinarily be such a distressing event; exciting, yes, and certainly important, but whatever enthusiasm he’d been prepared to unload on his brother and his fiancée had been thoroughly destroyed when Tobirama’s newest cub bolted into the compound without warning, tugging a thick scroll along the ground with her blunted baby teeth and bearing news that shattered all of Hashirama’s expectation for this meeting.

Mito’s soulmate – the young woman she’s been with since before Hashirama even met her – vanished without trace into the belly of the Lightning Country mountain ranges over two months ago. No one – not even her summons, who by all means should be able to find her when everything else fails – has been able to contact her or determine her whereabouts. All they know is that she left for a mission there and abruptly fell off the face of the earth; it’s not even known whether or not she made it to her destination before- 

Hashirama’s perpetual optimism demands that he refuse to even consider the event of her death, but the practicality he’s had to develop as the next Clan Head reminds him that she is missing, has been for a dozen weeks now, and is only one kunoichi.

She may be the Princess’s beloved, but the lives of a search team cannot be risked, not with the autumn setting in on those inhospitable mountain slopes and the very slim possibility that they’d find anything indicating the presence of a single young shinobi, dead or alive.

Tobirama hasn’t sent any letters since then. The cub – he thinks her name is Asami, but he’s heard her referred to mostly as Peanut – had deigned to accept some sashimi, cheek scritches, and a night spent indoors before returning to her summoner and had been infuriatingly close-lipped when questioned.

She probably can’t read yet, Hashirama thinks. Either that or Tobirama really has sworn his leopards to secrecy. Probably the latter; Tobes is quiet but still a horrible gossip, and his summons are pretty much the only creatures he’ll chat freely with.

He spends the next few hours in a fit of gloom, kneeling in the midst of his plants and whispering sweet nothings into the familiar verdant caress of their leaves. He’s still like that – dirt smeared all over his nice kimono, burrs and seeds caught in his hair – when Kaoru bursts in with the information that Tobirama and Mito are back, along with the small contingent of officials and family members that have come with them for the ceremony.

It’s only when the boy has been giving him an odd look for several seconds straight that Hashirama abruptly realizes that he looks like a mess, but there’s no time to clean up; it won’t matter either way, really, because whatever hit his reputation will take for his unpreparedness would probably equal whatever damage being late but neatened will do. 

He walks carefully back to the chambers where they receive noble guests and allies, every muscle in his body wobbling strangely in a way they haven’t ever before. His nerves are prickling, his ponytail is sticking to his neck with cooling sweat, and his stomach is tied in knots – oh. He’s probably just nervous, then. Hashirama does his best to put on his Serious Brave Official Heir Face, but apparently not well enough, if the scalding glare he receives from Butsuma when he finally shows up is any indicator.

He tries to ignore that, but it’s kind of difficult when the man stands directly behind him and radiates enough killing intent to make the guards look queasy.

Hashirama tucks his bangs behind his ears and straightens up as best he can – there won’t be much salvaging of his dignity, but with Tobirama in attendance there was never any real hope for that anyway – and sucks in a deep breath before darting into the audience room.

The scene he’s met with is icy.

Uzumaki Mito is perched primly on the tatami mats, her long hair tied up into an elaborate net of braids and her jūnihitoe notably absent of any botanical grime. Her expression is so dark and cold and her posture so statue-like that he immediately moves on, cataloguing every member of the room: Tobirama, wearing his politics mask as per usual with Peanut the summons tucked securely into his hold; Uzumaki Akira, Mito’s mother and the current Clan Head as well as the ruling Princess of all Uzushio, with an ornamental sword laid neatly across her lap, veined hands clutching at it with white knuckles; several kunoichi he doesn’t know but who he recognizes as the Handmaidens, Akira’s elite guard, from the coordination of their wardrobes and matching armor; three or four older shinobi who must be retired and are likely here as representatives of the elders.

Mito does not meet his eyes. She doesn’t meet anything, her purple gaze fixed firmly on some indistinguishable point in the horizon, her left hand twisted in her skirt. She digs her fingers into her leg so harshly through the fabric that Hashirama has to assume it’s where her Mark is – Tobirama’s last, curt missive had ended with the news that as far as Mito herself knows, her soulmate is not yet dead, but their Bond is dangerously weak at the moment, and she clearly wishes she was anywhere but here.

Hashirama would sympathize with her if he had any idea what it felt like, to lose another part of your soul; he just imagines the overwhelming, all-consuming grief when Kawarama and Itama died, how he _still_ has to clutch at his chest and take slow deep breaths whenever he sees cross-shapes and juxtaposition of ebony-on-ivory, how sometimes, he’ll sneak into the room Tobirama claimed in the apartment they share and just inhale the scent of his last baby brother. His _living_ baby brother. He’s never liked the Uzushio trips for the sole reason that Tobes is away from home in foreign territory for so long, even if it’s one of the only reliable journeys he’s likely to take in his life. 

Mito’s gaze snaps to him and Tobirama is staring quizzically – apparently, he broadcasted those emotions a little too much, like he always tends to do – so he just waves his hand and laughs too loudly and flickers to her side, shaking her hand vigorously and wholeheartedly glad to see the way some of the ice in her face thaws just a bit at exposure to his warmth.

That’s a pretty big reason why he’s _like that_. This damn war has been going on since time out of mind and everyone is tired; he’s tired; he thinks even the land is tired, because the whispers of tree leaves in the wind sound so grief-laden and exhausted that it’s a wonder they don’t just dissolve. It’s a wonder that nothing has just _broken_ underneath the impossible weight of existence. Hashirama is Clan heir, will be Clan Head pretty soon; he knows more than most what it feels like to be forced into standing when you carry the world on your overworked shoulders.

He and his are running low on…everything, really, so he’ll do whatever he can to keep superficial smiles on their worn faces and bring life and light back into this dull tomb of a world.

If that necessitates making an absolute fool of himself in front of the Sage and the kami and everybody, just to relax some minute amount of tension in an atmosphere so taut that it could snap under the force of a single word, well.

It was probably already going to happen anyway, and it’s not like Hashirama has any shortage of Hashirama-isms to share with his precious people.

Tobirama is making that _face_ , the one that makes his old man’s soul shine right through his snow-kitten exterior, but it’s one that Hashirama really only sees as a result of his every action, which must mean that his otouto is feeling comfortable enough to be visibly disturbed in front of other people.

That’s a rather low bar to meet, for Tobirama, but it is a bar nonetheless, and after those first few awkward minutes the tension eases just enough that the introductions and exposition and million other things they have to get through are only mildly painful instead of downright excruciating. 

Mito’s face when she gets an eyeful of their new home – saying he’d made it himself would be misleading, but he’s led extensive renovations now that the Clan Head’s chambers are his since he’s going to be married. It's not like anyone is sure if Butsuma sleeps anyway - is both precious and _hilarious_ , and Hashirama wishes (not for the first time, definitely not for the last) that Madara really was his blood brother, if only because that would mean he’d get the eidetic memory of the Sharingan.

“Anija,” grumbles Tobirama in his usual Tobirama way, either too surprised by the magnitude of change or too tired to bother with a proper tongue-lashing, his red eyes wide as Peanut wiggles free and explores the new jungle ensconcing the Head home, “isn’t this…a bit _much_?” 

As children, they never really spent all that much time in this place, training in the grounds or studying in the gardens or just wandering the whole compound, so whatever vague memories Tobirama has of this house and whatever expectations he had for Hashirama’s idea of renovation are blown out of the water – or perhaps buried under the small forest that wasn’t here two months ago - once he gets a good look at it.

The fusuma panels have all been replaced, painted with elaborate scenes of the sacred Fire Country forests, and the shoji doors partition the space differently, but by far the biggest change is the protective cradle of greenery nearly obscuring the structure from view altogether. It’s practical: the arrangement of the trees and plants serve as the best camouflage they can, since the house is already in the heart of the Senju compound, and were grown in such a way that it’s extraordinarily difficult to get past them if you don’t already know the way in. The reach of the canopy shades the expansive garden - exploding with plant life even at this time of year - and maximizes the fortified space inside the new grove without suffocating it.

Never let it be sad that Hashirama is no friend to the environment, nor any kind of person to pass up on an opportunity to obnoxiously showcase his treasured Mokuton while simultaneously keeping his new family safe within the hold of his most trusted guardians.

Peanut lets out a flurry of kitten-sneezes from where she’s lodged herself in the branches of a maple tree – the pollen must be getting to her, and Tobirama shoots him a truly _nasty_ side-eye for letting his precious baby summons get sick. That’s not really fair, given how _he’s_ the one losing track of curious cubs left and right, but it’s not like he himself has never been tricked by his summons and left in the dust, so he keeps his mouth firmly shut.

Uni chooses that moment to emerge from beneath a fern, and Hashirama tries to coo at the sight of his own summons but she glares at him too, which is not really all that effective considering just how _cute_ she is, but still patently unfair given that he’s already surrounded by a bunch of grumps on a daily basis.

With a shake of her flexible spines – they’re more than capable of piercing steel when fully braced in combat, but right now they’re relaxed – Uni snuffles up at Mito and clambers up onto her outstretched arm. The princess softens visibly at her huge black eyes and twitching pink nose, and cradles the hedgehog close to her chest, which—how _unfair!_ Uni _never_ cuddles him unless he cries at her and now she’s even stolen his fiancée like a spiky little _thief!_

Tobirama’s ruffled feathers smooth at the show Mito is making of fawning over Hashirama’s summons instead of the man himself, and flickers into the tree to once again draw Peanut into the protective clamp of his arms. He burbles sweet nonsense at her and traces one pale finger glimmering with mint-green iryō chakra down her gently sloping snout. The cub stops her sniffling, then, but resumes her flailing, apparently _ecstatic_ to thoroughly investigate her new den even though it…isn’t technically her den. She tumbles inside with Mito on her heels, and the squeak of flooring under their feet gradually fades as they retreat further into the house.

Tobes is smiling – his ruby eyes are narrowed and crinkled at the edges, even if his lips don’t do more than twitch – so Hashirama immediately has to go and ruin it by opening his mouth. 

“Soooooooooooo _ooooooooooo_ ,” he says, earning his little brother’s suspicion with a single word, “what’s, uh, what’s new, Tobi? Got some fresh jutsus? Did you finish that teleportation thing you were working on?”

Tobirama is, of course, instantly cautious, but never about to pass up an opportunity to nerd out about his clever new ninjutsus.

“Hmm, the Hiraishin? It’s complete enough to be used for short-distance travel – has been for months, and that stupid weasel’s _face_ when he realized it was _priceless_ – but anything beyond that is a lot more dangerous and requires exponentially more chakra, and I want to see if it can be made to work like a shunshin if you anchor _yourself_ with a seal, maybe that will give a considerable amount of freedom to travel beyond pre-placed markers as long as you know your destination…Hashirama. _Anija._ You _asked_ about it, you can at least _pretend_ to pay attention until I’m done talking, honestly.”

He _was_ paying attention. It’s not like it’s _his fault_ that the sky abruptly turned pitch-black with the gleaming iridescent finish of oil, nor is it his fault that the narrow crescent of the moon is suddenly flushed with a deep red the color of blood.

Tobirama follows his line of sight and immediately his face hardens into battle-readiness just as Mito hurls herself out through the doors with a shout on her lips and a horrified expression on her face.

 

TWO DAYS’ TRAVEL FROM THE IMPERIAL PALACE, MIZU NO KUNI, WARRING CLANS ERA

FIFTY-THREE HOURS EARLIER

 

Madara has spent enough time on the road during missions to have the iron self-control to keep himself from strangling his brother as they pack up camp, but even with that restraint – long-practiced, and sorely needed now that Tajima is so gravely ill and he himself is already beginning to take on the more important duties of being Clan Head – he is _sorely tempted_.

Izuna has begun to fancy himself an author and has been composing _poetry_ about the ‘exquisite musculature’ of Senju Tōka’s thighs for _three hours straight_. If Madara didn’t already hate the woman for killing his Clan members and being so undeniably _Senju_ , then Izuna’s warbled odes to the feel of her chakra and her skill with her naginata would be more than enough to suffice. He was delighted to no end when his Mark manifested – a she-wolf wrapped in bleeding thorns, stalking across his chest beneath his collarbones – and ever since then has refused to exercise any kind of maturity or _shut up about it._

Despite the relative infrequency of their river meetings, he’s already had to shoot down Hashirama no less than _seven_ times, because apparently the idiot has forgotten just how paranoid Madara’s become with Azuki’s abrupt cessation of communication, leaving Izuna as the only brother left to worry over in person. The Senju heir is under the wild delusion that he would be willing to either marry off his rat sibling to that oni kunoichi or consent to allowing the traditional enemy of his Clan to build herself a hornet’s nest right in the heart of their ancestral lands. _Insane._ When Madara had shared this flawless wisdom, procured after one entire day spent listening to his otouto wistfully mumble explicit _garbage_ about the Senju woman to the koi, Hashirama had burst into distraught tears and gone off about how _he_ would _gladly_ send his own albino demon to warm _Madara’s_ futon before stopping halfway through and nearly giving himself an aneurysm when he realized that would mean sacrificing Tobirama’s questionably pristine virtue to his best friend.

Childhood dreams of peace or not, the killing intent that had nearly solidified in the air around Hashirama in his overprotective anija mode (different from his sennin mode, but not by much; can be differentiated by measuring the amount of clinginess, and by the fact that the Senju is _far_ more violent in defense of his baby brother) had just crystallized Madara’s own resolve to not let any member of his rival Clan anywhere near himself in any kind of intimate context, which shouldn’t have strictly been _needed_ , given that he’d never had any intention of doing so in the first place, but-

He’d honestly rather drown himself than have to withstand the full force of Senju Hashirama when the man is worried about his beloved little monster. It’s alright, though, because any thought of Senju Tobirama sends him into such an overwhelming, boiling rage that a potential partnership is safely in the realm of ‘Madara has become addicted to hallucinogens and must be euthanized like a lame horse for the safety of Clan and kin’-level craziness. The fact that he has _no idea_ what could possibly cause his opinions on the brat to be so mind-shatteringly _strong_ just makes them that much more intense. He’s pretty sure they’ve never actually _met_ , and the only times they’re close enough to see each other are in the middle of battle, when even a sensor can’t risk paying attention to anything beyond their immediate surroundings lest they risk being gutted.

 _Maybe_ Madara has never been the most stable shinobi to ever flirt with pyromania, but he’s not completely batshit insane (yet), and is determined to stay that way at least until he can kill Tōka and ensure that she will never get within another fifty meters of Izuna in her horrible witch _life_.

If he has to hear about Izuna’s vision of the honeymoon sex they could be enjoying – frequently featuring things that he’s pretty sure are very solidly impossible, as well as an unfortunate excess of leather - _one more time_ , he might just give up and murder the obnoxious little bastard himself.

Threats of violence slide right off Izuna’s ego like water off a duck’s feathers, though, and when he launches into another monologue undeterred by Madara’s promise of sending _him_ to fight Hashirama, he just gives up and flicks through a series of hand signs that suppresses his hearing entirely. With enough hair shielding his face from any inconvenient little brothers who might attempt to catch his eyes, the time remaining until they reach the point where Madara leaves in one direction to head to the Imperial Court and Izuna leaves in another to spearhead a hit-and-run in Tea Country passes much quicker than it had before.

As horrifying as listening to Izuna babble about his crush had been, it’s a far lighter topic than the worrying silence Azuki’s kept on all topics unrelated to his mission objective for nearly a year now. His position as one of the Shogun’s closest advisors is more than invaluable for what information it provides and what political power it’s granting the Uchiha. Sucking up to Minamoto is a blow to their pride, but there is no denying the way it keeps unaffiliated Clans and passing strangers from offering their support to the Senju and brings reliable allies and job requests coming in from within Hi no Kuni and beyond.

The wars have been going on for so long now that nobody really remembers why they’re being fought – Madara himself picks up his gunbai only for the wellbeing of his Clan and for the memories of those he’s lost to it – but they’re very likely to end soon. The only reason the Senju have managed to hold out so long is Hashirama’s ability to guarantee them food and lodging, even in winter, which negates their need to pay precious ryō for those necessities and ensures that they never have to worry about starvation or exposure unless they’re stranded away from home. The Uchiha would have very likely lost already if it wasn’t for infiltration specialists like Azuki creating secret ties to powerful people across the continent and making sure they have continued access to the unending drain of resources needed to fuel a Clan at war. 

Madara is an older brother, though, and he still worries. Azuki is his mother’s son and not his father’s, but he’d grown up very close to Tajima’s family and is sorely missed but grudgingly respected for the long-range reconnaissance he carries out so far from the relative safety of the compound. He was always a gentle, cheerful child, poorly suited to the front lines and open battle but phenomenal at stealth and undercover work; although he’s got three years as ambassador under his obi, Madara’s spent enough time in various noble courts to know that they poison anything they can.

He spends the rest of his journey running until his socks bleed red and refusing to stop – who _knows_ what might happen if he’s even a second too late to some unforeseen trouble he has no idea of?

Madara reaches the palace in record time and probably terrifies the poor guards and servants to death with his acidic attitude, but he’s not in any mood to entertain the guise of politeness and he’s got a job to do; missing his brother isn’t enough of a reason to justify leaving the Clan for a month-long venture to the Shogun’s stronghold, no matter how heartwarming.

He’s officially here to request that the Uchiha are formally recognized as the strongest shinobi Clan in Hi no Kuni once and for all, which would grant them the political leverage they need to chase off the Senju’s remaining allies – except, perhaps, the Uzumaki, _Sage_ are they stubborn – and then force them into a ceasefire and, eventually, peace. It will likely only be possible if there’s no other way to keep fighting; Hashirama isn’t the Clan Head yet, and Butsuma is a foaming, raging warmonger, but it’s a start. As long as there’s a tentative cessation of killing on sight, they can safely wait until he’s in his grave and Hashirama is settled as Head, and then they’ll get their happy ending.

If he also wants to float some vague ideas about establishing a village where all of the Clans can gather and flourish and not die miserably just because, well. It’s _his_ dream too, and he’s not going to take a backseat to _Hashirama_ just because he doesn’t have the Mokuton. 

He’s ushered into elaborately decorated guest quarters and immediately left alone. He has an audience with Minamoto, but his influence as Clan Head and legendary shinobi isn’t enough to make the gears of bureaucracy grind faster than they will, so he tries his best to relax and not hyperventilate about how he can’t sense Azuki’s chakra anywhere in the vicinity. 

That’s not exactly a reason to worry, Madara tells himself, trying to believe it. It’s not like he’d spend _all_ his time cooped up in a gilded birdcage; he’s probably better off getting some fresh air, maybe taking a quick vacation to an upscale onsen far away from court.

He’s probably not dead – while his missives have been uncharacteristically curt and businesslike, they’ve not stopped entirely, and nothing he’s written about the atmosphere here suggests that he’d be in any danger of assassination. 

Not, Madara thinks crankily, wrestling with his travel-stained clothes and wincing at his blisters, that any assassin worth commissioning would just _let_ the mark know they’re a mark.

Several hours pass as he unpacks from the road and polishes his weapons to a mirror finish, and over that time he gradually talks himself down from taking his gunbai and _demanding_ to know where Azuki is; he’s calm enough that when he reconsiders it, the first thing he thinks is that there’s _no way_ he’s going to face any uptight civilian lords looking and smelling like he does. He sets out a clean outfit, the uchiwa prominent on the back of the cobalt robe, and goes to inspect the bathroom, which is impressively modern; there’s running water with temperature control, but he still uses a small Katon to heat the shower to his satisfaction.

It gets a little more complicated then, because he has to wash his hair.

After roughly 45 minutes of wrestling with his impractical mane of nightmares and misery, he’s tamed it enough to comb out the countless knots and tangles and – clumps of random detritus that had been caught in snarls that he’d apparently just _not noticed_. It takes another good hour to work in and then wash out all of his oils and soaps and shampoos; he wouldn’t ever bother with it, but the few times he’d been proud enough to go without, the consequences had been. _Unfortunate_. 

When he’s _finally_ done with his subsequent dip in the bath and satisfied that he’ll be able to appear before the Shogun without looking like he’s been dragged backwards through the worst of Fire Country underbrush, he ties his hair as neatly as he can (read: not very neatly) on top of his head in some mimicry of the styles popular for men here and makes himself presentable.

He’s taken a truly obscene amount of time to just pamper himself into civility and lounge about in his underclothes, making stupid faces into the mirror and practicing stirring motivational speeches he’ll never give, when he finally notes a trace of Azuki’s chakra flickering to life in tunnels beneath the Shogun’s private quarters.

Madara _knows_ it’s stupid to lose his temper just because he has a _feeling_ something’s wrong, but at the sickly hollow echo of Azuki’s coils where there should be candlelight-harmony-jasmine, his mind goes completely white and his eyes spin into the Mangekyō before he has time to stop himself.

He snatches up his gunbai and bolts out into the courtyard proper, decapitating some poor woman who looks surprised to see him there and running faster than he ever has before deeper into the palace, blood pounding in his ears.

Madara is a shinobi, but more often than not he employs Kiri-style stealth, leaving no living beings left to notice the corpses rather than no corpses left to be noticed at all, and despite his very thorough euthanization of any combatant he comes across, the alarms have long since been tripped and the news that the castle is under assault spreading rapidly.

He doesn’t care, because somewhere in this fucking maze of a building, his little brother is _suffering_ , standing in a miasma of great pain and misery that isn’t his but _could be_ if he’s not _fast enough_ , the way he wasn’t fast enough before— 

Madara explodes into a long, open chamber with a dragon-like roar and hurls his gunbai into the ribs of the bleach-white, bark-skinned _creature_ blocking his view of Azuki. It falls into two pieces with a strange gushing noise and continues to wriggle around on the floor, but there’s no time to focus on that. This room must be a specialized penitentiary of a sort, because while his brother seems to be _physically_ unhurt and is standing on the right side of the bars, there’s a dark-skinned teenager he doesn’t recognize curled into the farthest reaches of the prison.

He hurtles with the force of a comet into his little brother, wrapping Azuki in a hug so crushingly tight he momentarily worries he’s broken a bone before his heart drops into his stomach and he realizes he’s got a whole lot more to worry about than some hairline fracture in the ribs. 

When Madara stares into his face with a desperate expression, emptied eye sockets stare back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> peanut the snow leopard is the single greatest oc ive ever made in my life im crying just thinking about her. tobirama cries too but thats bc hes hand-raising her. its tough to be a single father when youre only 17 and just one (1) twunk but he makes it work...madara and matatabi also adopt peanut. kid ocs broke, summons ocs WOKE. everyone joins konoha bc of the tiny little leopard cub......Shes Just So Fluffy.......
> 
> hashirama's hedgehog summons are my other favorite thing. idk if you know this but hedgehogs are uhhhhh ADORABLE and tiny prickly babies!! he's tried to rename at least three of them madara but for some reason the chief hedgie never lets him [thinking emoji] uni means sea urchin if my memory is right and ngl im naming like 2/3 of the ocs after the japanese hedgehog accounts i follow, which is great now that ive introduced actual hedgehogs cause i dont have to worry abt whether or not they're people names. imagine toro is like. the japanese equivalent of calling your cat 'whiskers'. this is what keeps me up at night
> 
> although madara literally means 'spots' so i think i can breathe a lil easy abt this
> 
> hashirama suggesting a political marriage ft. his little brother and then flying into an inconsolable rage at the possibility that someone might then get to be ~~intimate~~ with his little brother is canon, probably
> 
> madara: thinks one (1) time about toberto sandjuice, his Real Life Soulmate  
> madara: what is this feeling, so sudden, and new ,,,,,,,,  
> madara: ah yes i am genius and brilliant 1000 brainman, the uchiha are so fucking blessed, it must be LOATHING!


	7. look me (in my eyes)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Uchiha Madara has an audience with the Shogun and a belated date with death. Zetsu strikes again. Kyashi isn't dead quite yet, but she's pretty damn close. Surgery is performed by several individuals who are in no way remotely qualified to get anywhere near the human body, but it is still a success despite the odds. One-sided banter is exchanged in a very inappropriate context.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ok so Definite eye gore in this one, surgical procedures that probably shouldnt work out but do cause ~magic~, minor character death :-/ much sadness and grief in general
> 
> id say im sorry for this but i really didnt know exactly what was going to happen and also im not sorry. felt kinda like this was an episode of ninja grey's anatomy, which should tell you everything you need to know about my experience with legitimate medical practices
> 
> i dont like this part :-/ but i think i had to include this scene. just fucking hate writing zetsu apparently, and the tone feels off, but i just really wanted to do a prison snark scene lmao, so i did. Simple Indulgence
> 
> no real scene changes but several POV changes. this isnt the last yall will see of the hole in the ground where there lives a zetsu
> 
> this ones a lil shorter but im feelin real bad scoob so here it is anyway

BENEATH THE STRONGHOLD OF THE SHOGUN, MIZU NO KUNI, WARRING CLANS ERA

DIRECTLY AFTER THAT

 

Days-old blood paints Azuki’s soft cheeks with dried, flaking crimson. He’s _alive_ , but he _isn’t_ – there’s chakra in his coils and it seems like Azuki’s, but only because it’s physically within his body – whatever foul energy keeps him animated thrashes and twists in his chakra veins and radiates such a revolting, rancid aura that Madara has to take a step back and brace himself to keep from vomiting.

When released, Azuki just drops to the floor like an empty-eyed puppet, sprawled bonelessly on the bedrock, completely unaware of the sheer intensity of the _horror_ burning in Madara’s veins and making his whole body seem three times heavier than it is. 

It can’t be happening. Not _again._ Last time Madara swore on the lives of his Clan that he’d _die_ before cremating another brother, and— 

_It didn’t matter._

He wasn’t fast enough. He wasn’t strong enough. Even now Izuna is roaming the wilds, and _anything_ could be happening to him and Madara would never notice until it was already too late.

That seems to be a pattern.

He isn’t aware of the white creature knitting its own body back together, nor is he aware of the sharp golden eyes watching him from the gloom behind the bars. He’s barely aware of himself, drowning in too much and not enough and spiraling the way he hasn’t in _years_ , not since his mother’s death.

He hates his _fucking_ eyes and how the sight of her ripped nearly into two is burned perfectly into his memory, his youngest sibling torn right out of her gut and then _pulverized_ , her glassy stare strange and waxy on a face he’d always known to be warm and loving— 

The nightmares are worse on those days when his family is gone too far from him, when there is no soulmate for him to be comforted by and no Izuna to sit quietly with in solidarity.

It feels a little bit like that now, only he’s stranded in a foreign territory where he’s just made himself an enemy by slaughtering every trained soldier he encountered on the way here, and there is no remote possibility that he will not die if he doesn’t get his act together. 

He thinks he might be yelling, or maybe screaming. His throat is raw and painful, tingling the same way it does after a Grand Fireball; he doesn’t attempt any jutsus now, though. There’s no point to it - the damage has already been done. 

The white creature drags its reformed corpse upright and advances towards the locked partition of the dungeon without turning to face him. It melts through the barrier, even though it undoubtedly has to be reinforced with _some_ kind of chakra, and then Madara distantly registers shrieks coming from the shadows, higher-pitched than he is capable of producing, and a flood of thundersnow-midnight-citrus fruit. It fades nearly as quickly as it had come, though, and his senses still aren’t working right – it’s possible he’s hallucinating, because the only thing he’s sure of is the stench of Azuki’s empty body rotting even as it stands up and reaches out to touch his forehead.

He can’t bring himself to push the clammy hand away or rip the arm off like his reflexes demand him to; it’s foolish and juvenile and _useless_ , a meaningless pulse of affection fluttering in his chest that no longer has any recipient, but that’s still his baby brother. Whatever demon wears his face now, it’s still his face, still soft and round and familiar, porcelain-pale and splashed with constellations of freckles.

He can’t _hurt_ that face. He has to, he knows he’s in danger the longer he remains paralyzed in place, but he can’t break his own stare. He’s powerless to do anything even as the odd white yōkai materializes within his line of sight, catches his unfocused gaze with strangely familiar eyes, and sends him hurtling into unconsciousness with a flash of red light.

 

As soon as the latest stuffy civilian is ushered out, Zetsu’s Minamoto shroud dissolves into its latest form, a mold of its original black ghost-self and one of its new plant-clones, topped with some botanical extras. Becoming truly corporeal has both increased its capacity for action and made stealth more difficult – fortunately, it recently discovered that it has the ability to perfectly replicate organic beings as long as it consumes their essence. Awfully convenient, that is.

Maybe, Zetsu thinks giddily, it _will_ get to devour the court and all of the useless meat-sacks within it. That would be a nice reward for the incredible progress it’s made towards its Mother’s resurrection. A competent Fūinjutsu user had been rather easy to obtain, especially considering this one has such close ties to the Uzumaki, but that just makes her presence in the hold even _better_. It’s not going to keep the second Uchiha, more than likely, but it does have a plan for those oh-so-elusive Mangekyō Sharingan. That ridiculous practice his Clan has of swapping nerves and organs among kin will come in clutch for something, at least. It has already implanted Azuki’s pilfered Mangekyō into its favorite clone, and—

Ahh. Zetsu can make the regretful incident in the dungeons into a _perfect_ opportunity to win itself the forced allegiance of the Uchiha, and, if humans are as brash as it has known them to be, it may not even have to work to obtain the Senju DNA it requires to evolve the Sharingan into the Rinnegan, which is a stroke of luck it hadn’t counted on but is so blessed to have received. 

Zetsu is not really superstitious, for all that it is the manifested will of a goddess, but it can’t believe that this is anything but a sign from fate confirming the importance of its work. It disintegrates into shadows and slips down to the secreted dungeons, silently watching as the red-eyed clone incapacitates the girl and then Uchiha with admirable efficiency.

“Shiro-san,” it croons at the clone as soon as it zips itself back into Azuki’s body and blinks at its master with the Sharingan. Shiro doesn’t know how to deactivate it, but the latent chakra it receives from the God Tree is more than enough to fuel the energy demands of a dōjutsu and keep the corpse from decomposing too much.

“Yes,” replies the clone. “Shall I harvest these ones, too, Master?”  
  
Zetsu emerges from the darkness to more closely examine Madara’s body slumped on the floor. Thank goodness he’s just unconscious; that will make this next part _much_ easier, and it can probably put the girl to good use too. If it does this right, it won’t even have to bother with attempting to bring humans back to life again. Gracious, those first few attempts had been so _messy._

“Actually,” it says, releasing the wall of corrupted chakra keeping her placidly behind the bars, “I believe we have a change of plans.”

Shiro quirks Azuki’s thin black eyebrows – this one does so love human expressions – and then turns to the kunoichi uncertainly.

“You can go ahead and possess her, Shiro,” it reassures the clone, recognizing several microexpressions that denote hesitance in humans. “I’ll be right by your side; there’s little chance she’ll ever even realize she was freed, and she can be locked away again easily enough. This will likely fail if we do not have some kind of iryō-jutsu to stabilize the patient with, and some of the seals she knows should work well enough as long as you’re the one making them.”

Shiro nods, then, ever so obedient, and sheds Azuki’s body as easily as it had taken it before slipping through the bars and into Kyashi. Luring her into the mountains with a mission hadn’t been remotely difficult; ambushing her afterwards with a team of samurai and a paralytic toxin had been even easier. She put up a rather commendable fight for a heavily drugged teenager, but she was still taken. 

Zetsu had not ordered the Gold and Silver brothers to leave her on the island so long ago specifically because it thought she might become a convenient source of Fūinjutsu, but it isn’t exactly unhappy that’s what happened.

Kyashi’s Clan is long gone, now, erased in the wars with only this one half-blooded child left behind; even if she did somehow regain consciousness under the drugs, Shiro’s possession, and the control seals they’d taken from her unreasonably well-stocked storage scrolls, it would be easy enough to keep her here. 

Easy enough to offer a blood Clan and a family to a girl with neither, a girl who never truly forgot she was no Uzumaki. Easy enough to extort those atrocious emotions that plague the human race. 

Shiro, clad now in Kyashi’s skin and marveling at the myriad of chakric tattoos all over her body, is quick to readjust to the sensation of foreign chakra coils and easily sterilizes the entire room with a flash-coating of Raiton that it seems to delight in now being able to perform.

The unique properties of lightning chakra make it ideal as a base for medical jutsu; it can burn through infections in a flash, reawaken and reconnect damaged nerves, even restart a stilled heart. It can become the sharpest, most delicate scalpel, and the most brutally effective cautery. It will suffice for this operation; neither of the Zetsus are medical practitioners of any sort, but enough time sorting through Azuki’s memories and skills has given Shiro a good idea of what must be done, and enough of the God Tree’s chakra funneled through Dokuzetsu will ensure the transplant is accepted.

Shiro lays the Uchiha brothers side-by-side – it has just returned its Sharingan to their homes in the skull of their original owner, and is quick and efficient when it sketches out the stasis seals in blood and then activates it with a spark. After that, it’s just a matter of plucking the eyes out of Azuki’s head – simple enough, because that’s already been done before several times – and then transferring them into Madara’s with a low-level space-time jutsu that exchanges matter in one place with matter in another. Once they’ve been swapped, Shiro gets to work reconnecting optic nerves and nurturing the dual development of the Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan; a boon to Zetsu here, and a thank-you of sorts to Madara, for letting them keep his eyes.

It’s only two hours or so before Dokuzetsu takes the lead to finish the procedure, injecting natural chakra into the bodies so that they recover as they should; with a small enough amount, it can ensure that there are no deformations or infections or any other complications, and that there will be only mild pain once Madara reawakens. 

He’s given a great deal for the cause, after all. Why not repay him with the crowning glory of his beloved Clan’s kekkei genkai?

On that note, Shiro is starting to fracture under the intense assault of Kyashi’s chakra reserves, which time has proved to react rather _violently_ to foreign energy that enters without permission. It drops her back behind the bars, restores the aural barrier, and resumes its bone-white plant-form, just in time to witness her groggily start to curse at it, true to her character. 

Zetsu is firmly of the belief that their continued need for _her_ brain in particular to be largely unaltered is _deeply unfortunate_ , because the more time it spends exposed to her personality, the more it wonders why it shouldn’t just obliterate the entire human race here and now.

It still has need for them, sadly, and it’s been gone too long already; after one last scan of the patient to confirm that all is going well, it vanishes up into the Shogun’s palace and sneaks back into Minamoto’s skin.

 

The first thing Madara notes upon waking up is that his entire body has a migraine. His eyes are pounding under the force of the most painful headache he’s had in months, and his orbital sockets feel oddly raw, like—

Bolting upright and poking at his face with curious fingers, Madara is so relieved to find he still has eyes that he doesn’t immediately register the slick stickiness of blood dried across his nose and cheeks.

He remembers. He _remembers_ Azuki being a dead man walking, and when he activates his Sharingan with a squint, there’s familiar yet foreign chakra lurking there that hadn’t been before.

“Yo,” comes a disarmingly human voice from behind the bars – why isn’t he locked in there, again? – as soon as he hauls himself to his feet. “Oh, damn, you’re not dead. I thought you would be, but I guess the Zetsu doesn’t need your body if it’s already got the eyes. Sorry about that, by the way.”

Madara is so stunned by some _disembodied voice_ trying to have a _conversation_ and still so shocked from literally everything that’s just happened to him that he trips over his own feet and shrieks like a banshee.

Not his proudest moment, and significantly less proud when this undignified reaction is met with rasping, giggling laughter. He snarls, but that only brings his companion as close to him as they can go while still imprisoned – it’s that kid, he realizes, a tattooed kunoichi with blood and gore all over her hands and a very annoying laugh. 

“ _You did this,”_ he growls, not stopping to consider _how_ the girl could have possibly fucked with his eyes from where she’s clearly being restrained without access to chakra, because _what the hell_.

He’s darting forward before he knows it and a split second from digging his fingers into _her_ eyes for good measure when she slips one inked arm through the bars and punches him square in the jaw. 

“Again,” the kunoichi continues, remarkably unfazed for someone who just implied that she’d committed _eye theft_ and then _assaulted_ him for it, “sorry. Sucks about – was that your brother? – about _that_ , and sucks about the whole botched transplant eye magic thingy, but it’s not like I’m any kind of medic-nin, y’know, and from where I’m sitting… I could be wrong, mind you, since I have no legendary dōjutsu and just my lowly regular human person eyes, but this doesn’t seem much like a hospital.”

Madara lets out a screech of rage at such a casual mention of that inhumane defiling of Azuki’s person. At least his _other_ brothers were properly put to rest, ashes to ashes, as have all Uchiha for centuries. Azuki was just _used_ and thrown away like garbage.

“Do you – do you-” Words are very difficult to come by, interestingly enough, when one has witnessed more than enough violently unpleasant surprises to fill a year in the span of a day. “Do you think that _telling me you’re not a doctor_ will make me _FEEL BETTER_?” He’s legitimately horrified that some outsider heathen had even _touched_ the Sharingan, and nothing is improved by her off-hand admittance of the fact that she has _no medicinal training_. 

The kunoichi arches one white brow at him before looking down at her hands – _covered in Uchiha optic tissue_ – and grimacing at the shredded nerve endings that seem to be lodged under her fingernails.

“No, but it’s not my job to do that, and not my fault that the things that happened to you happened to you. That’s how life works, Uchiha, you should know that by now.”

Madara’s seething rage melts out of him at the reminder of the very recent past. Azuki…

He’s just. He’d failed his family _again_ , and the Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan – he’s thick, but not _that_ thick, and well aware of what eye transplants mean for people like him – can do nothing to change the past. He wishes that he was with Izuna and able to hug him so much that his battered heart aches under the strain of it, but _wishing_ won’t do him any good. 

“Hnnmgn,” he growls at the girl, who is still scowling at her unclean hands, “I have a job to do, too.” He’s still _technically_ dressed for court, even if his nice robes have seen some considerable violence in the past day or so, and his gunbai is leaning right against that wall – some soap and water and he can go right before the Shogun and demand to know what the ever-loving fuck is _wrong_ with the monsters in his basement.

The kunoichi raises her head and squints judgmentally at him, apparently confused by such a manful show of determination and strength in the face of adversity, or possibly wondering if he’s suffering from brain trauma.

“You…you’re…you’re just gonna _go back_? Chat up the civilians and sneer at some samurai and do whatever it is you came here to do?” Spoken like she was a civilian herself, unused to war and what it forces people to become to survive it.

“Yes,” Madara replies, ignoring her confused, indignant squawking and slinging his fan over his shoulder. There’s blood crusted onto the tiled flooring, but that’s a familiar enough sight that it’s easy to brush off as he exits the dungeon and follows his chakra-sense to the Shogun’s personal quarters.

 

He doesn’t encounter anybody on his way, and the bodies he’d left behind in the wake of his first frantic journey down here have been removed with no trace left of them.

Madara’s instincts are long since tripped up by the sheer oddity of this place, and he brushes easily past the samurai guards to let himself into Minamoto’s residence.

The bastard is sitting calmly on the tatami mats, wrapped in an informal yukata and drinking _tea_ like _nothing has happened_. Even stranger, he _smiles_ when he sees Madara, paying no mind to the killing intent clogging the air, and gestures for him to sit down as well, which he does only because he’s so thrown off by the sharp contrast of the demon zombies in the dungeons and the mild civilians up here.

“Uchiha-sama,” whispers the Shogun, black eyes meeting Madara’s squarely, “I must sincerely apologize for what horrors those oni have forced on you. We have been having many problems with them, lately, sneaking in past every ward we set and possessing random people just for the sake of killing.” The older man shakes his head, fingers tightening dangerously on his cup as he sets it down with admirable restraint.

Madara does not speak. If he does, he might just slaughter Minamoto where he sits, and although he doesn’t want to hear what the man has to say, he’s owed whatever reasons he can get if not an entire explanation. At _least_. 

The Shogun closes his eyes and takes a deep, slow breath, and several more before he opens them again. Madara has the strangest hunch that the person he’s looking at now is completely different from the one who’d been there just moments before, but what Minamoto says next completely distracts him from that and everything else on his mind.

“I am…well aware of the current atmosphere in Hi no Kuni, and similarly aware of what that has meant for your Clan in particular. I would request that you forgive my gross lenience in the matter of your brother’s security by officially offering you an alliance with my forces, to be forged on your terms and to be used to put an end to the fighting in Fire Country once and for all. Uchiha Azuki was a loss that should not have been a loss, and in return for his life I humbly ask only for your forgiveness, and your acceptance of this proposal, gauche though it is in the wake of what has happened.”

Madara forgets how to think. He can only hear ‘ _an end to the fighting’_ echoing around in his head over and over and over, and though his entire soul _burns_ at the idea of allowing Azuki’s gruesome death to go without revenge – his Mark, his ocean-dragon, is freezing and painful the way it is whenever Madara’s about to make a decision his soulmate wouldn’t agree with – it happens pretty often, but rarely is it so _agonizing_ , leeching his entire arm of feeling and turning his blood to ice.

He. He _has_ to do this. He has no choice.

If he doesn’t, Izuna – sly Izuna, ridiculous Izuna, little-rat-bastard Izuna, Izuna the newfound poet with his many praises for his Senju kunoichi – _Izuna could be next._  

Madara pictures his last brother impaled on Senju Tobirama’s sword and he agrees to the Shogun’s offer even as his soulmark bites at him, causing pain so excruciating he’s going light-headed and dizzy.

Madara’s soulmate…it’s blasphemous for him to even think it, but his soulmate will have to just _deal with it_. In this matter, he will put aside his Uchiha ways and completely ignore his soulmate’s feelings, because as much as he treasures them he _doesn’t know them_ and his Clan will _always_ come first.

He has to use his left hand to sign the scroll that’s been opened in front of him because the nerves in his right have gone dead. That night, when Madara reaches through his darkened Bond to try and catch the shards of sensation he’ll sometimes receive from his soulmate, he’s left grasping at a nothingness that fills his empty chest with the deep-black-torture of abandonment and shatters the remains of his composure so ruthlessly that he can’t keep himself from crying.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> zetsu can perfectly impersonate people so madara is sort of fooled by its shogun disguise?? the only reason he found out azuki is cause no one was bothering to cover up the whole 'soul yanked out through the eyeballs' thing
> 
> ive started responding to comments which i really dont need to say in the notes but fuck it im gonna do it anyway
> 
> for the record azuki is like. physically still around. i mean his soul is in the pure lands with like literally everyone else on earth but his body's still being used as a zetsu/sharingan-container for the moment
> 
> lmaooooo didnt intend for this to be so angsty......next time we get more tobira and thats gonna be. Spicy


	8. tell me everything (is all right)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mito and Hashirama are married. Tobirama commits a felony and has a respectably dramatic fallout because of it. Hashirama does the unthinkable.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wanted to make this longer and include jinchuuriki but.......... it didnt happen so theres that lmao
> 
> i retyped this like seventeen times and i think its alright but i dont want to look at it any longer unless i just die with my brain melting out of my eyes as is wont to happen to human people
> 
> i think i remember promising happiness but. it looks like thats still not gonna happen for a while lmao f

ON THE CLIFF OVERLOOKING THE FORESTS, HI NO KUNI, POST-WARRING CLANS ERA

SEVERAL WEEKS LATER

 

It’s the wedding day. 

Mito is radiant in her red-and-white kimono, embroidered with glimmering seals that shine faintly in the sunset. Her hair is tucked up into its buns and mostly hidden under the tsuno-kakushi, but the gleam of her golden hair ornaments is still visible in the dying light of day.

She looks like a corpse.

Hashirama’s standing next to her, almost comically oversized in comparison; he looks… _alright_ in his black groom’s kimono, with his long hair brushed to a sheen and then tied neatly back into the high ponytail he favors for formal events, and if Tobirama spends any more time looking at his brother his eyes will fall out of his head and he’ll _die_. Mito doesn’t seem to care either way, though, given how she’s staring quietly into the setting sun and letting the ceremony just wash over her.

Her Bond has been silent since the first day she came here and the sky _broke_. None of them have been able to figure out what happened or why, and to his credit, Hashirama has been as quiet as possible and given Mito considerable space to grieve, but.

It’s the wedding day, and Mito may very well be a widow already. She’s mechanical and still throughout the ceremony, listening to Hashirama stumble through his vows without a single expression, pouring and drinking the sake but doing no more and no less than is required of her by tradition.

Tobirama is stuck behind the table with Peanut and Uni hidden in his own kimono and keeps his face a mask as well. She won’t appreciate pity and certainly not while she’s doing her duty.

Death is nothing new anymore, nothing surprising; it still hurts, knowing that his dearest friend will likely never be herself again with the loss of her soulmate, but there is a marriage alliance to fulfill, and life must go on. 

It’s Tobirama’s turn to act; he steps up to the altar as the priest acknowledges his role in their coupling, like he actually did anything at all beyond try to warn Mito away, but it’s over quickly enough, and when he presents the evergreens to the altar and the rings are exchanged, the affair is finished.

There is no reception. 

Well, not really. Mito and her new husband return to their home, doing an excellent job of getting half of Hashirama’s garden all over their formal wear, but nobody follows; Tobirama will probably drop by later for a drink and to interrogate them about what, exactly, they’re going to do next, and he has no doubt Tōka will take pleasure in joining him, but the war is very much still raging and there are no resources or positive emotions to spare, not with the Uchiha and their allies acting so strangely and the growing scarcity of jobs that comes with the distantly approaching winter.

Peanut shivers. She’s getting downy fur all over his nice robes, but she looks so criminally adorable that he doesn’t do anything but coo at her lovingly – after, of course, a quick check to make sure no one’s around to witness him expressing fondness for another living creature. The Senju compound is no home to Tobirama even though he really has no place else to go; his only _real_ family here is Hashirama, Tōka, and now, he supposes, Mito as well, although she’s been on that list ~~along with Kyashi~~ for about a decade already. 

He’s meditating with his summons in his favorite garden, the one with the biggest koi pond – Yuuki having joined them, to entertain Peanut with raucous tales of her papa’s misspent youth, like Tobirama isn’t barely an adult and continuously making terrible decisions that bite him in the ass – when Butsuma storms towards him with all the subtlety of a raging bull and the ground cracking beneath the angry impact of his sandals.

Tobirama raises his eyebrows at his father; the man’s gotten what he wanted, he’s bought Mito and successfully hitched her to the heir, what could he _possibly_ be upset about _now?_

Poor phrasing. There’s _always_ something for Butsuma to be angry about, and given how he’s come directly to Tobirama…he just hopes that his esteemed, venerated Clan Head doesn’t frighten Peanut in his rage, because if he does, Tobirama may be forced to kill him, not to mention how Yuuki would react to a perceived threat to his niece.

Thankfully, though, he just stops short and clenches his hands into fists, snarling so heatedly Tobirama idly wonders if he’ll start to let off steam. He’s seen it happen before, and it was almost impressively dramatic, especially for a man who hates fire nearly as much as he hates the Uchiha.

“The Uzumaki woman,” Butsuma growls, the sound reverberating in his chest like he’s a tiger, “why didn’t you _warn_ me she was so damn _disobedient_?”

Oh.  
  
Oh _no_.

This conversation is one Tobirama does _not_ want to have – he doesn’t even want to consider the implications of Butsuma insulting Mito so disparagingly on her _wedding night_ , and there are many – but his father looks about two seconds away from finding her himself and trying to attack her, which would end interestingly, but…that wouldn’t be the _best_ way for Hashirama to finally become Clan Head, and would probably undermine the alliance that led Mito here in the first place.

Butsuma’s chakra is seething so violently that Tobirama engages him just so that he doesn’t lash out on someone else who couldn’t handle the force of his temper. It’s happened before and is why Tobirama became the way he is in the first place; he can protect the Senju from their leader when Hashirama is unable to, and they don’t have to worry about sinkholes opening up underneath their homes.

He does take a brief moment to mourn the death of the formal kimono he’s still wearing, but it’s only a moment and he catches his father’s attention before it can wander elsewhere with destructive effects.

“What happened, sir? I thought you were pleased with the strength of Mito-hime’s bloodline and her skill as an individual as well? I can assure you, in our conversations she has never indicated any reason why she wouldn’t be a perfectly fine wife for Hashirama, and a suitable mother to his children.” 

She hadn’t done so in any conversations, per se, but she had unleashed her stockpiled frustration in training sessions and beat Tobirama up more frequently and thoroughly than anyone else has managed in a very long time. It would be admirable if he hadn’t been watching Mito mourn the death of her personal agency and autonomy; she knew what marriage means for women back then, and now that her time has come she hasn’t forgotten.

Butsuma snorts and grinds the stones beneath his feet into fine rock dust that makes Peanut cough from where she’s tucked safely away by the mouth of the pond – Tobirama grits his teeth and locks down on the growing swell of protective rage that surges within him at any sign of unwellness, but that’s far from uncommon when he’s forced to interact with his father, who seems to take an unconscious joy in vaguely threatening his precious people.

“Just for starters, she’s _refused_ to take the Senju name or abdicate her position as heiress to Uzushio, and said to my _face_ that she ‘wouldn’t dream of abandoning her island just to calm the impulsive, misogynistic rage of some small-minded _man_ ’—” Ah, yes, that’s the Mito he knows and loves; Tobirama silently applauds her for pulling herself out of her sadness long enough to land such an articulate insult. “— _Apparently_ , she expects at least _one_ of her children to inherit the Uzumaki surname and train to be the _next_ ruler, which – do they not have _families_ outside of Fire Country or does Akira think so little of me as to stick me with a defective bride instead of a _normal_ one? Hashirama _,_ that _fool,_ even supports the idea of her continuing to serve as an active kunoichi, like he’s not sabotaging the respectability and integrity of his _own household_ by permitting his _wife_ to just run free around the continent and back to the island whenever she wishes to! Tobirama, are you _listening_? That boy cannot possibly hope to serve as an effective Clan Head if he won’t even think about fulfilling his proper duty as a husband. I’m preemptively making you my heir—”

What, thinks Tobirama, the dread that’s been building low in his stomach cresting higher with every word that leaves Butsuma’s mouth to pollute the cool silence of the night. 

_“What,”_ comes out of his mouth, and then nothing else, because— 

He can’t just _do that!_ He can’t decide he doesn’t like Mito after she’s been promised to Hashirama for a _decade_ and then fuck _Hashirama_ over too for having the gall to be a respectful fucking person who _minds his own business_ — 

\--but he can. Butsuma is the Clan Head, Butsuma is their general, Butsuma is the one the Senju listen to when they need guidance. It is well within his power to expel Hashirama from the line of succession because of his ‘inability to lead a household’ – it sounds like a bullshit excuse, and it _is_ , but the elders will take it, as well as any free choice Mito makes for herself, as a sign Hashirama is incompetent as a shinobi and as a man, and so is unfit to rule the Clan.

Like _Tobirama_ would be any better. He’s almost hyperventilating just _thinking_ about being the Clan Head proper – that’s not _his_ job, it’s Hashirama’s, and he’s already firmly settled into being a chief advisor/paperwork demon/person who makes sure things actually get done.

And the Senju – as a whole, mostly, with few exceptions – _hate_ him. He’s strange and deformed and cold, he has no heart and no feelings and no love for _anything_ , he is such an inferior waning moon in comparison to Hashirama’s overwhelming sun.

But…between Hashirama, a person they actually trust and like and would be willing to follow but who is perceived to be _unable_ to lead since he can’t keep his own _wife_ under his thumb, and Tobirama, who is something along the lines of an evil ice golem but a _strong_ one, silent and strange and horrifying but good with the children and ever at the ready to defend his people, never unwilling to pay any price to keep them safe…

He doesn’t think about it. He doesn’t notice the way Hashirama’s chakra flares in rage from the house, he doesn’t see Mito running up to him – when did she get here? - and yelling something out in warning. He isn’t aware of _anything_ but the roar of blood in his ears and chakra in his veins and the almost disappointing ease with which he _rips_ every molecule of moisture from Senju Butsuma’s husk of a body and then forms a few hand signs that reduce the spray of blood and mucous and bodily fluids to a fine pink mist that settles over the garden, staining Tobirama’s robes and obscuring the withered corpse that used to be his father.

Nearly _two decades_ of this man haunting him and pushing him beyond all human limits, and it took nothing more than three hand signs and an unrefined surge of Suiton to reduce him to _that_ , to a desiccated goblin laying twisted on the stonework, so small and cruel and hateful.

There are gentle hands wiping foul-smelling fluids from his face, a voice murmuring comfort in his ears. Something small and warm and dense is set in his lap, and when he brings soiled fingers up to touch it it’s soft and fluffy and alive – oh, _Sage_ , Peanut and Yuuki watched that _whole thing_.

It’s several minutes of mindless breathing and crushing Peanut so fiercely into his chest that it’s a small miracle she doesn’t mewl or twist away – instead she kisses at his throat and the underside of his jaw with her tiny rasping tongue - when his brain reboots and his cognitive functions are restored and he realizes that he just fucking _killed his father_ , and it was _so easy,_ and there is not a single part of him that regrets it.

Tobirama distantly registers Mito brushing sticky, reddened bangs out of his face and hauling him to his feet, draping his long lean body over hers and having absolutely no problems dragging a man nearly 25 centimeters taller than her back to her new house, along with one young snow leopard and one much larger, older snow leopard, although admittedly Yuuki is perfectly capable of walking unassisted and does so, keeping a watchful eye on the surroundings.

Tobirama’s vision blurs and swirls; some indiscernible amount of time later, he’s wrapped firmly in Hashirama’s hold, with one large hand carding through his filthy hair and the other laid loosely over the nape of his neck in a grounding gesture.

He doesn’t look up into his brother’s face. Neither of them had any love for Butsuma, but Tobirama had just _murdered_ him, and Hashirama has always been kind to his enemies where other shinobi are cold; it breaks his heart to think about it, but he may have finally worn his anija’s infamous patience to the breaking point.

When the hand resting on his neck begins to move, he slams shut his eyes and prepares himself for death. 

It doesn’t happen. Hashirama cups his chin and forces him to stare into warm dark eyes, and when he does the other immediately starts sobbing, right on cue.

“Oh, _Sage_ , Tobira, I thought you would _die—_ I mean Butsuma had already laid into me and Mito so meanly that I thought maybe he was finished, but then I could sense him about to start a fight with you and then there was a surge in your chakra and then something _died_ and I’m _so glad you’re safe_.” 

He doesn’t stop talking there, but Tobirama can’t focus on his words anymore; he just lets himself collapse into his big brother like he’s a little kid again and curls up as his vision goes black.

 

 

IN THE GREAT HALL, SENJU CLAN COMPOUND, HI NO KUNI, POST-WARRING CLANS ERA

EARLY THE NEXT MORNING

Hashirama’s head throbs. Half an hour in to the council meeting and the elders are already demanding Tobirama’s head on a pike – well, some of them have been wanting it since he was just a baby, but now they’re all vocal and opinionated about it and Mito had to see her family back off to the island and Tobes himself is still sleeping in the guest bedroom after several thorough showers, laying in a pale lump under the covers with several of his summons as well as Hashirama’s own Uni, who _again_ only shows kindness to _other people_.

Hashirama could _really_ use some kindness right now.

Setting aside the questions of patricide and high treason and talk of curses and albinism, his position as the new Clan Head is hotly contested – it was well known that Butsuma more than likely intended to name Tobirama as his heir over his eldest son, and just as well known that neither of his children had any real affection or even respect for him.

Hashirama doesn’t really have anything to say about that, considering his immediate reaction to his father’s death was _relief_ , but Tōka seems to be more than happy to defend him in his place. She’s snarling at Yakuma from her place on the tatami, her hands twisted into claws and digging into her thighs. She never gets the respect she’s due as a warrior; she’s a kunoichi, and she’s _loud_ and opinionated and has no problems telling everyone exactly what she thinks about their view of her. 

He wishes he could be that brave, but he’s not. He’s just sitting at the head of the room, trying to will the ground to open up and eat him; he can’t even twitch without alerting everyone, since the flooring was made to squeak and chirp whenever something moves on it. It’s a decent security measure, but _god_ is it annoying in times like these, where Hashirama’s focus is even worse than usual and his head works too fast and too slow at the same time and he can’t remain still without his muscles feeling like steel springs about to snap.

It’s getting him adverse looks even more than usual. Hashirama’s more eccentric traits are generously ignored in the face of his sheer power, but right now it can’t be denied that he lacks the intelligence and competence and clarity of mind of his younger brother, even as that younger brother is being tried for murder and viciously defamed by a raging pack of geriatric ninja.

“Hashirama-sama,” snaps one of the elders, a scarred veteran named Satoshi, “you _must_ understand that Tobirama cannot be allowed to remain in the Clan considering his actions and the effects they will have. A shinobi of his age and caliber who cannot control his temper and would unleash his power on his own kin – on his _Clan Head_ – is too much of a security risk to keep within Senju ranks, no matter his relation to you or what skills he possesses that may serve us well.” 

Tōka nearly starts yelling at that – he can practically see her fighting to keep her chakra stable in her tenketsu points - but she manages to keep her voice low and deadly quiet when she responds. 

“Satoshi-san. Tobirama has risked his life time and time again without even asking to be treated like a decent human being in return. He is one of two individuals keeping Uchiha Madara from just marching up to the compound and burning it to the ground. He is second in strength only to _Hashirama_ and his ingenuity and loyalty cannot – you _cannot_ think of punishing a single lapse in control with death or exile, because either way we lose one of if not our most valuable members and may as well forfeit in doing so. You may not have noticed, but he does the vast majority of the administrative and organizational work that goes behind actually running a Clan, and when I say that he is necessarily for the continued survival of the Senju as we exist now, it is as a kunoichi, not as his cousin.”

The old man seems like he might try to protest that, but it’s the same argument that’s been thrown back and forth for thirty minutes and he already knows that attempting to shake Tōka from her decisions is more difficult than diverting the path of a river. He just turns to Hashirama again, and the flint in his dark eyes isn’t nearly as painful as knowing that he serves as the mouthpiece of the old guard – what Satoshi says comes directly from the thoughts of most of the older members of the Clan, the ones with the most influence and the longest, most reliable track records, the people who could very well succeed should Hashirama ignore them and stir them into mutiny.

He knows it’s impossible, but he sorely wishes Tobirama himself was here for this; he’s never met anyone with a cooler head and a better way with complicated solutions, and when faced with this much nuance and such a difficult, meaningful choice, Hashirama just wants to retreat to his garden and chat at his plants and bury his troubles in fertile soil.

Tōka can already tell he’s breaking before he even thinks about opening his mouth. She probably already knows what logic he does it with, but the sheer intensity of her killing intent still shatters something deep inside Hashirama’s heart, almost as much as the impact of the next words to come out of his mouth.

There simply is no good ending here, no winning – Hashirama wants peace for the Clan, but he wants it because of his brother. He wants his people to be happy, which won’t be possible if Tobirama stays with the Senju. He knows maybe better than anyone else with the possible exception of Mito just what a deep, giving heart Tobirama hides underneath his glacial shell, but to share that knowledge now would do nothing more than convince the elders that Hashirama is too emotional and subjective to be allowed to rule, breaking the last straw of his already shaky claim to his position as Head.

He is to decide between the health and happiness of the last of his immediate family or his ability to care for the health and happiness of his family as a whole.

He closes his eyes to sigh and wonder if his entire tenure as Clan Head is going to be like this, and when he opens them again, Tōka has vanished from her seat, the floors screeching under her stomps and the air wavering with the strength of her raw fury. 

“Very well, Satoshi-san,” Hashirama mumbles, feeling one thousand years old and utterly heartless. He’s not even a day into his reign and he’s already no better than Butsuma ever managed to be, which is agonizing even to think about, but—

It still hurts less than the mental image of Tobirama’s corpse thrown into the river to be stripped clean by carp. It still hurts less than considering himself as an outcast, helpless to lead his precious people to peace and forced to watch as they destroy themselves with a war most of them never wanted to fight in the first place.

It hurts less than telling the arrangement of smug, wrinkled faces before him to bring him Tobirama at once, so that he may look his only remaining little brother in the face and inform him that he is no longer welcome as a Senju. 

For the good of the Clan, Hashirama reminds himself, more devastated than he can ever remember being despite the lack of tears salting his cheeks. Kawarama and Itama are shards of his soul that he mourns to this day, but at least he was not the one to deliver the blows that killed them. For the good of the Clan, Hashirama has to abandon Tobirama to the angry, war-torn wilds and tell him never to return.

Even if the Uchiha agree to peace immediately following this, even if he spends the next hundred years saving lives and protecting children and bringing joy where there had been none, even if he himself ensures there will never be another soldier younger than twelve, Hashirama doesn't think he'll be able to redeem himself.

 

TOBIRAMA’S APARTMENT, SENJU CLAN COMPOUND, POST-WARRING CLANS ERA 

DURING THE WITCHING HOUR OF THE PREVIOUS NIGHT

The moon is at its apex in the inky, star-studded sky when Tobirama slips out of his fourth shower of the evening, finally satisfied that he’s clean of all remaining traces of blood and pus. Peanut and Yuuki have long since been dismissed – normally he’d keep Peanut around, being responsible for raising her and all; it’s the first time he’s been entrusted as the sole caretaker for one of the leopards’ rare and precious cubs, and he treasures her as much as he would his own daughter. 

He almost considers her his child, so he’s _definitely_ not going to have her around when he completes the rest of tonight’s duties. He still feels a little bad about casting that genjutsu over Uni - it'll make him look like he's still unconscious on Hashirama's guest futon, but going after summons of any stripe just feels dirty. 

Tobirama is dressed down in civilian clothes, a half-assed henge hiding the truth of his coloring and his god-awful glasses firmly in place. He would use the sensory-enhancement jutsu he created specifically so he wouldn’t have to wear them, but he wants to conserve his chakra as much as possible and they do add to his disguise. He’s not _running away_ , exactly, but if he doesn’t Hashirama will be forced to choose between himself and the Clan, something that would _kill_ him. Tobirama has faith that his brother could do the right thing and put the Senju first, but not without hurting himself beyond all repair, and he would literally rather _die_ than cause his anija such crushing pain.

He’s hoping that he won’t, but even if he does, Hashirama won’t have to worry about killing his own brother. Tobirama is the one who gets to claim all the elusive infamy that accompanies kin-slaughtering, _thank you very much_.

He doesn’t actually know where he will go or what he plans on doing, which is as exhilarating and freeing as it is terrifying; Tobirama is usually the type to not fly off into the great unknown without at least some certainty that everything will turn out alright, but now he throws his old habits to the wind, along with his affiliation and his family and everything else he’s ever known. All he’ll be taking with him when he leaves is a few changes of clothes, a handful of kunai, his katana, and some ryō.

(Hidden in the storage scroll is his faceguard, polished to a mirror sheen with the Senju mon lovingly maintained against the scratched metal. It was a gift from Hashirama when he turned sixteen, and he can’t bear to think of parting with it now, even though he’s effectively Clanless.)

Tobirama might just travel the world, helping people in need, or become a farmer, or start his own little café somewhere, or (most likely) go searching for Kyashi. If nothing else, then Mito deserves to have her soulmate back with her – a futile search almost certain to end in death with no real payoff beyond rescuing one kunoichi is exactly the kind of mission Tobirama can take on without guilt now, and it would be a disservice to their many years of antagonistic coexistence if he abandoned her now just because he murdered his father and was forced into shameful exile from his Clan because of it. She would probably hit him for thinking that, but he’s _right_ , and maybe once he’s succeeded, he’ll return to Hi no Kuni with a friend in tow and go boldly proposition Madara like he has nothing to fear anymore.

Even considering that gives Tobirama several very real things to fear, one of them being how Hashirama would react at the news that he ran away from home into the arms of Uchiha Madara like the dewy-eyed, tragically lovestruck heroine of a shitty romance novel. He can only imagine the _tears._

He does have his summons, though. If all else fails he will always have a den with Kaida and her kin, will be welcomed among their snow-coated, thick-furred ranks; he might fuck around and try to achieve Sage Mode, and it’s not like failing would be much of a deterrent if it means spending the rest of his life as a big, weatherproof cat. 

Several hours of dithering around his small, spartan home and reorganizing furniture he’ll never use again pass in a melancholy haze before Tobirama shakes himself and faces the reality that he really has to go soon if he wants to vanish into the night dramatically and leave his former kin in awe of his stealth and poetic surrender of the life he’ll be leaving behind. Izuna must be getting to him, Tobirama thinks grimly as he wraps himself in lightweight armor and his good winter cloak. If he spends this much time monologuing then he may just go ahead and turn himself in to the Uchiha as soon as he leaves, which is such a nasty image that he immediately sets out into the fading moonlight and kills the protective traps and seals set into his property as he goes.

The Mark on his back – a blazing red sun with five flaring sides and the trademark radial pattern of a Mangekyō Sharingan at its core – heats up rapidly in some places and cools significantly in others, the temperature shock spreading painfully across his shoulderblades. Apparently, _Madara_ does not _approve_ of Tobirama wandering to his doom without any true purpose. Imagine that! He really _does_ care! Tobirama’s blushing-maiden-secret-tormented-romance contingency plan is getting more and more credible by the minute, a sure sign he’s already losing a hold on his sanity.

He charges chakra in the soles of his feet and leaps silently out over the gardens and the suburbs and eventually out of the Senju compound altogether, wrapping his signature deep into his coils to avoid detection and not bothering to look back. If he does his resolve might break, and right now it’s the only thing keeping him together. 

If his soulmate wants him to live so much – wants _him_ so much, the man can go ahead and make it happen himself. Tobirama certainly isn’t going to bother – he can’t really have a future within his Clan anymore, not after blatantly committing patricide in public, and Hashirama will have an easier time coming into his role as Head if his oni little brother isn’t standing in his shadow, tainting his image and raising unfounded inquiries about his anija’s iron-clad integrity and too-big heart. That people will undoubtedly place a good deal of the offense they take from Tobirama’s actions on _Hashirama’s_ shoulders is nothing really all that new. They were very close as children, but the deaths of their younger brothers had driven them to become nigh inseparable, and that hasn’t changed over time. What Tobirama does is always placed in the context of Hashirama as a person, which is good because it means people associate him with responsibility and sobriety he doesn’t really possess, but backfires, now. Hashirama could have stopped him, after all. Hashirama is by far the most powerful in the Clan and disposing of a threat, no matter how near and dear, is objectively no problem for him. Hashirama will likely be forced to take the blame for the death of Senju Butsuma, which absolutely _will not stand_.

He leaves the acrid stench of burning cotton in his wake as he goes, ignoring the white-hot blistering of his Mark and shoving down his strongest emotions until he can’t feel anything but the wind whipping at his face and the ground passing beneath his feet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hmgsmngbhsgs back hurt, brain hurt, i cant write, ,,,, just how it be
> 
> senju clan: broke
> 
> tobirama running away to star in his own romcom ft. madara: woke


	9. and the people are happy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hashirama and Madara are caught in the act. Mito is herself. Izuna is horny on main. Tōka's just trying to live her life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one's a little lighter i think yall could use a nice break.......im sorry for izuna being horny on main but its just how teenage boys are. madara isnt horny so there's that.. no tobidrama this time but that's next uwu ;)
> 
> i didnt intend for mito to have bat summons but now that i think abt it its fucking awesome so here we are. also there are a few ways to read the world 'weasel' in japanese and they are itachi and izuna which Honestly? Fits.
> 
> uchiha tajima must have fucking hated his kids lmao naming them shit like spots and weasel so F lmaoo.....like tobi and hashi have weird names but not fucking like wack ass ones like those.... HOLD ON I HASAHFHADJKFHAS
> 
> i just got a fucking fantastic idea. i love torturing senju tobirama and inappropriate humor. cant fucking wait for this
> 
> also i couldnt resist making this a series where im probably gonna add little like one shots that are cute n happy and shit so i named it after pet me poppa from guys and dolls which. lmaooo im? not actually sorry

AT THE BANKS OF THE NAKANO RIVER, HI NO KUNI, POST-WARRING CLANS ERA

SOME TIME AFTER THAT

  

This will be only Madara’s second meeting with Hashirama since he returned from court several months ago – he’s been run ragged since his father finally succumbed to the sleeping sickness, and he can’t afford to throw his entire Clan into upheaval when they’re still getting used to a new Head. It irritates him that he’s _finally_ in charge of the Uchiha and still can’t draft a peace treaty, but with winter approaching quickly and the new abundance of missions resulting from their alliance with the Shogun, the Clan is busy enough as it is without the controversy of ending the war. He has to ensure first that his kin will be safe from hunger and exposure and the deadly bite of combat, as is his nature. Madara is a protector and a caretaker, and in order to lead his people into peace without shattering them or just rekindling the age-old hate between them and the Senju, they have to be fully recovered from the recent changes.

The Uchiha do not react well to surprises.

Hashirama is abruptly reminded of this when he tries to tackle Madara into a hug while he’s deep in thought and gets a fireball in his face for his efforts.

“Wh- _Madara!_ So _mean_!” the dumbass blubbers, patting the embers out of his hair and robes. “You’re even worse than Tōka and she’s only just stopped putting scorpions in my bed for what I had to do to Tobira! And only ‘cause Mito asked her not to! _Why_ am I surrounded by such hateful, aggressive people!”

“Because you’re an idiot in charge of a Clan at war, you idiot,” Madara reminds him briskly, in no mood to endure Hashirama’s particular brand of affection. His hair is longer than ever, and last time it took a solid _two hours_ to remove all the seed pods and leaves that had been snarled in it thanks to the damnable Senju and his affinity for plants.

Hashirama wilts again. His tenure as Clan Head began miserably and is only improving in bits – his horrible cousin refuses to speak to him, his wife is busy coping with her own loss, and he’s completely unanchored without his younger brother to make sure his paperwork is filled out and go over the budgets. 

“I can’t make her see that I’m _sorry_ ,” he whispers, slouching into a fit of gloom deeper than his usual dramatic episodes. “I can’t contact Tobirama or use any of the Clan resources to try and find him and he never told me about the system he uses to organize all of the classified files so I’m losing all the mission reports and everything else important too. Do you think they’re gonna impeach me for being a horrible, incompetent Clan Head? Do you really think I exiled otouto for _nothing_?” 

“I don’t think about that,” Madara tells him, which is true. He’s only got enough headspace to spare for Izuna, who is not pleased that he’s been largely confined to the compound even if he understands it’s just to satisfy Madara’s renewed paranoia over his continued safety. The brat’s taken to setting his god-awful summons loose in his house, which has resulted in chaos of no end and several close brushes with death.

“I’m sure your little goblin will be fine anyway-” A lie; Madara knows better to be sure that anything will be fine in a world like this. He’s been losing sleep and ripping out hair over the desperate sensations of loneliness and distress that color his Mark and echo out from his end of the Bond when he listens for them. He’s so fucking _tired_ of having to worry for the wellbeing of his family, his Clan, and now his mystery soulmate, who could be _anywhere_ and seems to be so achingly _lost_ , something that Madara’s own stress likely does nothing to help. “-and worrying about him isn’t going to do him any good if he won’t notice it, idiot. Just beat the Senju into place and then once they’re used to it you can try and petition to have him reinstated as a Clan member. It’s not easy, but it’s not _complicated_. Just focus on the problems you have now, dumbass, and stop making up new ones that you can’t do anything about.”

Hashirama takes a moment to consider that, but since Madara is surrounded by terrible human beings who constantly prove that caring for other people is a mistake, he doesn’t calmly nod and re-center himself but instead bursts into tears and buries his dripping face into Madara’s chest. He’ll be the first one to admit it’s been a while since he’s had anyone in his lap, but _Hashirama_ is the _last_ person he’d want to break that dry spell with, especially since the man won’t fucking stop _sobbing_.

Madara awkwardly pats at his back – Hashirama is ridiculously tall and broad around the shoulders like a tree trunk, and he’s had to fold himself up to fit in Madara’s embrace in a way that cannot possibly be comfortable. Hands fist themselves in his shirt and brush his wild bangs off of his face, and then he’s unwillingly exposed to the Senju Clan Head’s face _entirely_ too close to his. Hashirama’s got his snot-covered nose pressed right up against Madara’s, and he’s wearing the most pathetic expression he’s ever had the misfortune of seeing on a grown man of such notoriety.

“Do you…do you really think so? Do you really think that it’s possible for me to have a safe family and our peace and Tobirama back home with me all at once? Do you think that maybe there’s any _chance_ for us to really see our dream come true?” 

Holy shit, thinks Madara. Why is he so close.

“Holy shit,” says Madara, “why are you so _close_ , you imbecile. You’re getting your fucking feelings all _over_ me, Senju. I want no part in your _emotions_.”

This rousing speech not only fails to put a comfortable distance between the two of them – Hashirama just snuggles in closer, trying to plaster himself to Madara’s front with limited success and nearly kneeing himself in the chin in the process – but also doesn’t seem to be as calming as it had intended to be, since the man just sniffles like he’s a child with a cold and begins to actually _pout_.

Madara’s three seconds away from stabbing him in the gut and then filing for a restraining order when he’s rudely shocked back into awareness by the sudden presence of a red-haired kunoichi _laughing_ at them from the Senju side of the Nakano.

“My, _my_ , husband,” calls the woman, her voice breaking with amusement, “leaving me cold in our bed so soon without a single care for how I have no wife of my own to warm it? May I at least have the _pleasure_ of being introduced to your lover, or is he too shy about abetting adultery to do it himself?” 

She pauses to savor the way Hashirama leaps away from Madara like he’s been burned and gapes at his wife with wet, glittering eyes. Madara himself wipes all of the Senju goop off of him and concentrates manfully on getting his bushy hair back in order, since he might have to die if he meets the woman’s gaze.

“ _Mito-_ ” wheezes Hashirama, apparently lost for words and scrambling frantically away from her when she crosses the water in a single, elegant bound and props her hands on her hips so she can stare down at him judgmentally in proper form. “-What a delightful _surprise_ to see you out and about! This is-”

“Uchiha Madara,” Mito interrupts, turning her head slightly so she can arch one neat red brow at him and where he’s splayed on the stony shore like an overturned turtle. “I do know that much, but I would like to hear more – tell me, husband dearest, is this a new affair born of the spontaneous passion of the heart and the futility of an impossible love—” “ _Mito please it’s not like that!_ ” “—or am _I_ the homewrecker here, doomed to be married to a man already promised to another? Uchiha-san, _please_ do me a favor and get that constipated look off your face, I don’t care that you’re gay or my enemy or any of that other nonsense. I’m not here for you, and I _will_ be expecting information from you, but I don’t need it immediately. Now.”

Hashirama is fully-grown man, named the God of Shinobi for his famous invincibility on the battlefield and his unparalleled mastery with the ninja arts and the trademark Mokuton. He is 21 entire years old and the Head of his Clan. He is by all means one of if not the fiercest warrior to have ever walked the earth, and he quakes under the firm violet glare of his wife as if she is the Sage of Six Paths reborn, come to pass judgment on his actions.

Mito herself looks like a shark that’s scented blood in the water, and Madara takes a sadistic pleasure in watching her scalp Hashirama with words alone despite his growing hate for her and the knowledge that he himself is next. Honestly, assuming he would be… _intimate…_ with _Hashirama_! Just thinking about that kills whatever libido he may have once possessed. It’s possible that not even lingering traces of floodwater-starlight-spearmint will be able to save his dick from just shriveling up and falling off the next time he accidentally remembers his best friend 

Given, of course, that Mito doesn’t do it for him and just castrate him with her kanzashi once she finishes with her husband. 

She’s got Hashirama by the ear in an impressively firm grip and seems to have no trouble whatsoever dragging a man nearly a full foot taller than her off the ground and towards the water before throwing him bodily into the river with no more effort than it takes for her to straighten her silk kimono once she’s finished.

Hashirama is wailing something from the Nakano, his hair plastered to his face. He might be drowning, but Madara can’t bring himself to care, because Mito is advancing on him with the grim sobriety of the Shinigami packed into her tiny, delicate frame.

He does _not_ tremble when she seats herself down in front of him and whips out a teacup from absolutely nowhere. He _doesn’t_ , but the roaring vortex of her dense chakra overwhelms his senses in a way few other people have managed to do before. He might die today. He might be killed by this short, terrifying woman before he ever really meets his soulmate, and he only prays that she deigns to make it quick.

“Whatever you’re thinking,” Mito says briskly, shoving a cup of nori-scented tea into his lax hands, “stop it. Hashirama will be _fine_ , and I’m a sensor too, I can already tell you’re Bonded.” She snorts. “Besides, it’s not like I _want_ him in my bed. I have to have him there, but you’re more than welcome to borrow him if you want to, as long as you let me know first and don’t start any more wars while you’re at it.”

Madara stares at her, but she just winks at him playfully and sips at her tea. He’s pretty sure his mouth is open. Where on _earth_ did Hashirama find this woman? Was she crafted specifically by the kami to terrorize the mortal populace? Why does she just carry _fully prepared gyokuro_ around in her dress, along with what appears to be a complete set of fine china? _How_? 

“Buh,” he says with all of the articulation and grace that can be reasonably expected of him as a war veteran and a Clan Head. “Uh, _what?_ ”

“My god, you must be _slow_ , how do the Uchiha manage to get _anything_ done with you stuttering like a landed fish _._ You were here to discuss peace, right? Devise some kind of plan that will allow you to leverage the new authority you’ve gotten thanks to the Shogun against the Senju and force them into a ceasefire without undermining Hashirama’s position as Head, fragile as it is at the moment? You should know that waiting until winter has set in will ensure that the Senju are at their weakest and therefore more susceptible to any treaty you wish to strongarm them into, especially if you manage to not fuck it up entirely. Have it ready by January and I can bully the senile band of merry fools the Senju consider to be elders into at least considering it, which will make doing the rest much easier.”

Mito takes a long drag of her tea, making a small noise of satisfaction when Madara continues to look like an absolute dumbass as he’s trapped in his stupor and Hashirama flails his way back to the bank, crying to his wife about how _cold_ and _wet_ he is and screeching at the sky about karma.

“Hashirama,” she says, taking out a finely-crafted scroll and opening it to reveal a very long missive written in elegant green ink, “do be a dear and sign this, will you? Try not to drip on it, because if I have to rewrite it you’ll be sleeping on the floor for the next week." 

“This is my punishment,” he wails, messily sketching the kanji of his name onto the blank space on the document with the brush he’s been offered. “This is my atonement for abandoning Tobes and _I already regretted it!_ There is no _need!_ _No_ reason for me to be treated so cruelly by my own _wife!_ ”

“Yes there is,” reply Mito and Madara in sync, and when she looks back at him curiously, he decides then and there that he hates her with the unending passion of a thousand suns. This, oddly enough, makes his Mark burn frostily at his arm again, which just _fucking figures_. Of _course_ his soulmate knows Mito and likes her enough that Madara’s distaste for her evokes disapproving pain. Of fucking _course_. He’s so busy being enraged at the cold, uncaring universe for having the gall to be so wickedly nasty that he doesn’t consider the fact that this means they must _know Mito_ , and he misses the way she narrows her eyes suspiciously at where the dragon is hidden under his sleeve. 

“Witch,” Madara snarls at Hashirama’s wife, who has done something to make the tea and dishware and scroll disappear despite having no apparent storage anywhere on her person. Hashirama moans despondently and tries to flop into her hold, but she efficiently smacks him away and ignores his huge brown puppy eyes and high-pitched wails of distress.

“Mmhmm. It would be beneficial to arrange correspondence, since there’s no chance in hell Hashirama can make a coherent peace treaty by himself and especially not if he’s with _you_ —” Madara hates this woman _so fucking much_ and every second he spends in her presence makes him want to rip all his hair out. “-oh, Sage, just give me your arm, will you?” 

He squawks defensively when Mito snatches at his right arm, but she doesn’t even blink upon the revelation of his Mark, unlike Hashirama, who has continued to try and wiggle into her arms and gasps dramatically when he gets an eyeful – _this harpy is the first person to ever see his soulmark_. She bites into her thumb and keeps the grip on his arm iron-firm as she _smears blood across his dragon_ , but he forgets that entirely when a strange fox-like creature with _wings_ appears in a plume of purple smoke and digs its tiny little claws into her shoulder.

“Hideki,” she greets, and the little mammal that Madara takes an embarrassing amount of time to recognize as a bat – they’re not native to Fire Country – swivels its giant ears in response. “I need you to draw from Uchiha-san, here. Just enough for you to be able to track him, if you could.”

“Of course,” the bat answers pleasantly before weaving nimbly around Madara’s flailing limbs and clawing along his bare arm. It sinks long, snake-like fangs into flesh that is, thankfully, not covered by the Mark, but he still feels grossly violated when it slurps blood out of the bite before licking the wound clean and dismissing itself.

He wrenches his arm back and tugs the sleeve back down to his glove, nobly ignoring the way Hashirama has begun dancing around like a moron and screeching about his best friend being Bonded.

“A little _warning_ would have been _nice_ ,” he snarls at Mito, who rolls her eyes and rises to her feet.

“If I’d warned you, you would have tried to stop me,” she says, totally unrepentant, “and it was barely even a second. You’re hardly going to die of exsanguination. Hideki-kun drank your blood so he could memorize your energy aura, and now he’ll be able to find you and deliver messages and the like. You _do_ want peace, right?” 

Madara tries to find a way to be annoyed at that, but he can’t properly articulate it, so he just settles for sputtering indignantly and raising his voice over Hashirama’s babbling. “You’re planning on representing the Senju? You’re not even of their Clan, witch.”

“I’m the Clan Head’s wife and Princess of Uzushio,” Mito says primly. “If they’d rather the next few months of their lives be organized by _Hashirama_ , they’re welcome to enjoy what kind of disaster that would be, but as things are now, I have the most experience with both peace and diplomacy. If you have any terms or conditions, tell my husband or send him a message and I’ll reply.”

Well. Madara scowls at her, but Mito – _Uzumaki_ Mito, one of the greatest fūinjutsu masters alive even though she can’t be more than eighteen - just turns around and grabs Hashirama by the ear again, who starts to protest but goes slack and wide-eyed when she whispers something at him. He’s so shocked that he doesn’t even try to wave goodbye when she hauls him back across the Nakano towards the Senju compound, and Madara is left alone on the riverbank, massaging his right arm and wondering what the fuck just happened. 

He’s suddenly very unsure about the village he’d dreamed of as a child if it means that woman will bulldoze her way into administrating it. The stinging fog of depression that’s been emanating from his soulmark for the past few weeks is suddenly broken by a clarity and brightness he’s never received before, and Madara stomps his way back home with the distinctly bitter impression that his soulmate is laughing at him. 

 

AT A CIVILIAN INN NEAR THE BORDER, HI NO KUNI, POST-WARRING CLANS ERA

TWO WEEKS LATER

 

Izuna slips into the charming old hotel with a cheerful wave at the older man working the desk – he’d booked a room ahead of time for a very exciting reason and had gotten a discount for being such a ‘delightful young man with a big heart’. He wasn’t acting to get it, either, which is what makes his chest feel so light – he’s _actually_ here to meet his secret soulmate and almost-girlfriend, and even though the whole thing is almost disgustingly trite, he can’t help but giggle a little when he thinks about Tōka and daydreams about what will come of their first real meeting. His otter summons had had a hell of a time trying to find her, especially since Madara’s been keeping him practically locked up in the compound and had been five inches away from saddling him with a permanent guard, but…

After all of the bullshit that happened the last time he let a brother out of his sight, Izuna can’t find it within himself to be angry. He feels a little guilty for trying not to think about Azuki – he failed, considering his Mangekyō came in a few months ago, and even though it makes him feel cheap and sick to try and push it to the back of his mind now that he’s got the ultimate Sharingan and there’s nothing more ruminating could do for him, he wants to be _happy_. Madara’s the one wrestling the elders into a peace treaty and will also be the person trying to convince Senju Hashirama – well, the Senju elders, since the man himself would be only too ecstatic to learn of the upcoming end to the wars – into a ceasefire, presumably with more to follow.

Regardless, Izuna and his summons had managed to wrangle a meeting time and place out of Tōka; an admirable feat, considering they met once half a year ago and barely even made eye contact.

She’ll be here tonight, and Izuna couldn’t be more excited, even though his Mark has been hot and heavy with her rage. He’s pretty sure something’s been going down at the Senju compound beyond Butsuma’s timely death, but Madara has so far refused to tell him – his aniki has been in a horrible mood lately, and for some reason he clams up when he sees the color red – and he’s not sure he wants to bog down his first date with politics. There’s little else more effective as a mood-killer, so of course it’s what Izuna’s thinking about when a tall, long-haired woman punches him lightly on the arm, making him squeal like a stuck pig and whip around to face his soulmate’s laughter.

He _might_ sound like an aspiring poet, but just basking in Tōka and the heady feel of her warm, dark chakra as she mocks him for being inattentive makes Izuna feel twenty pounds lighter, and when he grins at her the smile he receives in return makes his heart beat double-time in his chest.

They’re settled down at a table enjoying some insanely good udon and better company when Izuna scratches idly at his collar, which exposes traces of his Mark. It prompts Tōka to frown and apologize for…being in a bad mood?

“Nonononononononono, noooo, nah, you don’t have to say you’re _sorry_ for being _mad_ ,” Izuna waves her off. “If I was related to Hashirama I’d be pissed all the time too. It’s not like…” 

He stops when he sees the way her face has gone stony, and apparently his expression shows everything on his mind because she finishes her food and drags him back to their rented room for privacy that does not, unfortunately, seem to be intimate or at all exciting in nature.

“You know that Hashirama’s the new Clan Head,” she begins, and the snarl on her lips when she says his name is almost enough to make him want to go and try to set the God of Shinobi on fire – he probably wouldn’t get much further than that – and in a single, repulsive thought, Izuna realizes that he really is Madara’s brother.

“Mmmhmmfngnn,” he says when she throws him an odd look. “…Is there something bad about that? You know we have the means to find peace, now, thanks to our alliance with Minamoto, and isn’t Hashirama literally always crying about sunshine and rainbows in almost every battle?”

What Tōka says next hits him with the impact of a Doton to the chest, and he’s not sure how to feel about it – from the look on her face, his soulmate doesn’t either.

“He exiled Tobirama. Or, well, he _tried_ to, but by the time he’d come to that decision he’d already left – packed up everything he needed from his apartment and just vanished into the night.”

Izuna tries to keep his exhilaration from showing on his face, because the Senju may be the single worst person to have ever walked the earth and Izuna’s own sworn rival, Tōka looks heartbroken when she talks about his disappearance and furious when she mentions Hashirama, which surprises him too – he never thought that the man would be cold enough to just kick out his own brother, even though he admittedly deserves it for being the single _worst person_ to have _ever_ —

Tōka’s kept talking, and if Izuna wants to get any understanding out of this story, he better start listening.

Apparently his rat bastard rival just _murdered_ Senju Butsuma, which is such a valiant act of goodness committed by such a vile man that it boggles Izuna for a minute. There’s no specific reason given, but from context he manages to figure out that the late Clan Head was not well liked even among his own people – no surprise there – and that he’d purportedly tried to keep his eldest son from inheriting his position.

That sounds about right, Izuna thinks grumpily, remembering his own recently deceased father and how heartlessly the man had reacted to his own wife’s murder. Good riddance. Still, though. He wouldn’t have expected Hashirama to choose his Clan over his brother. Even though that’s an impossible decision, Izuna will grant him that. Just thinking about having to decide between Madara (grumpy asshole nosy Madara, but still _Madara_ ) and the Uchiha (grumpy asshole nosy Clan, but _his Clan_ ) makes him feel a little queasy.

“Is,” Izuna begins haltingly, because expressing concern or care for any Senju beyond his soulmate is still a new and traumatizing experience, “…is there anything we could do to help? Open up about the treaty with the Shogun? Maybe we could get married and then threaten to commit suicide if our cruel, uncaring families refuse to support our ill-fated romance.”

“Shut your weasel mouth before I have to shut it for you, dumbass,” says Tōka fondly, because she is _the perfect woman_. “…No, I don’t think so. Hashirama still needs to get settled as Head and he’s gonna be in hot water with the elders for Tobirama for a while. At least a third of them are convinced he somehow planned it, like the little brat wouldn’t just disappear into nowhere for the drama of it all.” She pauses and tugs at her long dark hair, making Izuna want to rake his hands through it – when he does so, she leans back into him with a low, delighted purr. 

“I just hope he’s doing okay,” she murmurs, affection bleeding through the rough tenor of her voice. “I know he can take care of himself, but I’ve been beating up people who bully him since I was six, which means you better watch out too, weasel boy, ‘cause you are by no means immune to catching hands if you talk unwarranted shit about Tobes.”

“He dumped the river on me when I told him I wanted you to peg me,” Izuna confesses, making Tōka choke on a breath and have to spend the next minute or so coughing and thumping at her chest as he frets over her.

“I- _oh my god, did you really,_ ” she wheezes, laughing or crying or most likely both. He can’t suppress the elation and pride that blooms beneath his sternum at having made her laugh, and when she recovers enough to straighten up again he worms his way into her side and buries his nose beneath her jaw.

He can vaguely hear her saying “What are you doing, Izuna,” over where he’s licking along the dip where her neck joins her shoulder, but he can’t bring himself to care – her beautiful brown hair tickles as it brushes at his face, and the scent of her shampoo makes him dizzy and lightheaded.

When she gently tangles a long-fingered hand into his ponytail and tugs him up to meet her gaze, Izuna actually _whines_ , but he can’t bring himself to feel embarrassed – it’s not _his_ fault Tōka is so irresistibly tasty! He is but a victim of the cruel whims of fate, simply expressing his affection for his own beloved soulmate!

She’s giving him an odd look, but he’s distracted again by the firm press of her breasts against his collarbones, which is a sensation he wants to feel every single day until he dies.

“Izuna,” Tōka repeats, her voice soft. He lets out a little whimper, but she wraps her arms around him and hauls him properly into her hold, and it’s so nice and warm and safe that he nearly begins to fall asleep. He wants to activate his Sharingan so he can memorize the way her long eyelashes feather over her freckled cheeks and maybe also the color of her lipstick against her tanned skin, but he wouldn’t want her to reflexively think he’s attacking her…

“You know I’m not going to have sex with you, right?”

“ _What_ ,” Izuna wails, bolting upright and barely keeping himself from smashing his head into her chin. “Why would you say that _now_ , I wasn’t—do you not want—?”

Tōka’s rich, throaty laughter quiets him. He’s distressed, but she’s still hugging him, and he forces himself to relax again – not really all that difficult. She makes for a phenomenal pillow.

“You’re only seventeen, brat,” she informs him, which, yeah? He is? What’s the point? “I’m _twenty-three_ , and you can wait for a little bit. I still can’t disassociate you from Tobirama, which is not only horrifying and repulsive to think about but also makes me feel like a cradle-robber. It’s _okay,_ weasel, don’t cry, I’ll gladly fuck you if you want me to, just not _now._ ”

Izuna can’t keep himself from pouting, because _how unfair!_ He’s appropriately disgusted at being forced to hear Tobirama’s name when he’s half-hard, so unfortunately, he can kind of understand her point, but. He’s a teenager, yes, but that just means he’s _really horny,_ _all the time,_ and if Tōka means to keep him high and dry until she thinks he’s _ready_ or whatever then he really has to think she’s a sadist. 

Not, of course, that that’s _disappointing_. Izuna’s head is already full of delightfully naughty scenarios starring his soulmate and her chest and her naginata and lots of black leather…

She yanks on his hair in a way that's much more painful than sexy, and he’s startled out of his fantasies. Izuna rifles desperately through his Sharingan memories and tries to find that one expression of Tobirama’s, that one _pout_ , and when he does his very best to mimic the way his rival’s face had all but crumpled in the most heart-wrenching little frown, she just smacks lightly at his shoulder and then goads him into chattering about his own life for a while. 

She holds her word – they don’t have sex, even though Izuna is almost painfully hard by the end of their date, especially with extended snuggling, but Tōka just waves him into the bathroom for privacy. Fortunately, she does permit him to crawl back onto the futon with her once he’s done and showered – she’d already washed before coming here – and that night, Izuna gets to drift off into unconsciousness wrapped around his soulmate with his limbs tangled in hers and their heartbeats thumping softly in time with each other.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i kno a six year age difference technically isn't That much but it matters a lot more the younger you are there's a huuuge distinction between 17 and 23, which. We Dont Need No PedoPhilic Relationships No Thanks! izuna's considered a mature adult in this world but only just barely and tōka drinks her not a fucking creep juice every single day so that's that i guess. she also drinks her hot wlw juice cause im .. well not horny on main but i gotta say it folks. TITTY.........


	10. and the river has run dry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peanut and Tobirama adventure into the great unknown with mixed results. The Zetsu aids and abets animal abuse of a very specific sort. Matatabi experiences something very new, and she decidedly does not like it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> let me tell yall i had a fucking delightful time narrating peanut, who thinks of herself using her actual name - asami - cause its. her actual name but responds to her nickname cause tobi is the one who gave it to her. it has been brought up several times before, but the name madara literally just means 'spots', so if you see madara + female pronouns that's the leopard chief, not tobirama's soulmate, and holy shit lmao did she have an aneurysm when she found That out............i had an aneurysm when i thought of it if yall remember the random keysmashing i keep forgetting to delete from last chapter's notes
> 
> kaida (the name) is originally from 'the unthinkable' by nanimok where She is the leopard chief but i couldnt resist making madara-the-uchiha the second most important madara in tobirama's life at the moment, so now i've slapped that name on peanut's mom, who isnt a tiger mom cause she's just... Not A Tiger lmao
> 
> didnt know That was gonna happen this chapter but. It Did! sooooooo i guess That's That On That
> 
> me: wow huh the word count is already high enough it's ok :-)  
> me to me: HJGNN,MNGGFDH AD JECTIVES...........SH INY
> 
> everything is narrated by cats today no one else has rights. im sorry that this is utterly incoherent ill probably have to go back and edit it later. i do not like it but i cant think of any ways to make it better so improvements will have to wait and maybe ill like it more later

ON THE SLOPES OF THE SKYSPEAR MOUNTAINS, RAI NO KUNI, POST-WARRING CLANS ERA

IN EARLY DECEMBER

 

Asami has only been alive for a year or so, but she’s spent the vast majority of that time in the far south, in Fire Country and Uzushio, where snow is all but unheard of before the darkest pits of the deep freezes. The vague memories she has of her nursery in the Eternal Winter aren’t as bad as this, either; she’d chosen to bond to Tobira-sensei when she was just a few months old, nearly a whole season before she would have been allowed to poke her nose into the fierce storms outside the nursing den. 

She may be a snow leopard, but she is a rather pampered one, and she’s totally unprepared for the vicious blizzards that scream across the highest of Lightning Country’s many mountains. Tobira-sensei likes to carry her around – she’s still small enough that it’s not a lot of effort – but recently he’s insisted on wrapping her beneath his layers of furs.

Asami _does_ have her own – she’s very proud of her luxurious silvery pelt, and is delighted about the way her baby-spots are clouding up and developing into rosettes as she grows – but she can’t argue with her summoner about the way he babies her, since the winds would very likely blow her clean off the mountainside if she wasn’t physically anchored to something larger and heavier. Even huddled as she is against his chest, the subzero bite of the cold chills her to her very bones.

Asami curls tighter against her Tobira-sensei and wonders how his ears, hairless as they are and redder than his eyes from the exposure, haven’t just fallen right off yet. When she asked about it that morning, he’d told her that his Mark is very warm and toasty, but she doesn’t see how that would help at _all_ , since it’s on his back and not his head.

She just thinks that he probably doesn’t want to worry her, but it’s _not working_. They’ve spent a few weeks just enduring the nasty conditions out here and are no closer to catching any trace of the lady Tobira-sensei has told her so much about. Asami’s delicate senses are sharper in lower temperature, and she has detected no hints of citrus-ozone or star-gone-supernova. It’s not her place to question her surrogate parent – not when he takes such good care of her! Asami’s siblings have spent _soooooo_ long complaining about just how _spoiled_ she is, but she thinks that maybe they’re just _jealous_ that she’s the one who gets to be so close to Sensei and not _them_ – but she can’t quite keep herself from wondering at times exactly _what_ he hopes to accomplish here.

It’s _worse_ than searching for a needle in a haystack. If it was that simple, you could just burn the straw away with a Katon or use that magnet jutsu from Suna, and it’s only a _haystack_ , not an entire _mountain range_ stretching from Iwa in the west to Kumo in the east and nearly splitting the whole continent in two. Geography is not Asami’s best subject, but she doesn’t even need her supernatural powers to know that there’s a hundred million places Kyashi-san could be, given that she’s actually here and not somewhere else (avoiding the ferocious alpine winters like a _normal person_ ) or just dead.

Tobira-sensei might be the best sensor in Fire Country, but they are very much not in Fire Country, and they’re looking for _one person_. It’s been weeks and they’ve only made it to three whole mountains, and they’ve had to spend most of that time holed up in what shelters they can find because the storms get too bad.

He seems especially determined today, though. He hasn’t said why, but his chakra is more vivid than it’s been in far too long, and there might not even be a reason behind it; he’s been doing an awful lot just on hunches, lately, and it’s an _adventure_. Asami has been baptized with fish sauce, gotten to eat _ten_ bowls of ramen in _one sitting_ , thrown up ten bowls of ramen after eating them in one sitting, bravely defeated a postal worker who was coming dangerously close to her sensei, and many more things that she can’t even remember because _so much_ has happened. That’s another thing her littermates are bitter about, too. There aren’t many noodle stands in the Sagelands, and what the toads consider to be fine dining is considered to be barely edible by most other species of summons. 

Whatever. It’s not _her_ fault that she inherited the best taste from their kaa-chan and decided she’d wanted to live with the leopards’ only summoner instead.

Anyway. Tobirama’s finely honed instincts have proved themselves trustworthy so far, and it’s not Asami’s job to question them. She doesn’t know what exactly her job _is_ , because past experience would suggest she’s mostly treated like a human infant more than anything else, but she is only one year old, and is still learning how to read. She loves it when sensei reads to her – he’s got a mockingbird jutsu that allows him to copy most sounds and pitch his voice far outside its normal range, which makes even his longer, duller novels exciting.

He’s not doing that right now, though. Right now, he’s digging his boots into crushed ice and trying not to fall into the crevasse that gapes beneath them, and he’s doing an impressive job of it for a human with only two legs who is probably going to end up with frostbite sooner rather than later.

Asami is horrified at the idea of Tobira-sensei missing any of his strange, nimble paws, and she purrs into the side of his neck, trying to give him some of the warmth she doesn’t seem to have at the moment. His fluttering heartbeat calms a little and slows down when she does, so she spends the rest of the perilous trek across the cliffside playing housecat and keeping him relaxed and focused.

A mighty warrior, Asami is. Her foremothers would be so _proud_ to look down at her from the spirit realm and see her serving such a noble purpose. Thinking that just makes her grumpy and irritated, though, because she’s doing her _best_ to make sure Tobirama is at _his_ best, which has been very hard, lately, since he had to abandon his old den with the Senju. It’s very tough, crawling around the mountains trying to keep her summoner sane as he looks high and low for his misplaced littermate, but she’d rather spend the rest of her life giving him kisses and cuddles like any civilian cat than just leave him alone with his thoughts and the blizzards.

When they make it back to solid ground that isn’t sloping at a particularly alarming angle or covered in snow and sheet ice, Tobira-sensei makes the executive decision that they are finished for today and sets up the protective seals around their newest temporary den. 

She’s more surprised by the presence of a cave complex so big, radiating such awful natural chakra, than she is about her summoner’s ill-thought-out decision to nest in it for the moment. 

Once they have a fire going and the air temperature is back in the positive double digits, Tobirama lets her free to wander around the closest caves with a gentle warning to keep her paws to herself unless he can see her – fair enough, but she maintains that it _wasn’t her fault_ that the last den had such delicate structural integrity that it could be collapsed by one light jab from a single pint-sized cub. The further Asami gets from her partner, though, the stronger the influence of the bad chakra on her thought process, so she stays mostly within his field of vision and sharpens her small claws on the smooth rock walls.

She thinks that it’s kind of weird that a random cave in the middle of nowhere has such pretty, ancient carvings worked into the walls and ceilings, but she’s inexplicably attracted to discordant hum they radiate – it calls to something feline deep within her animal instincts and reminds her of the Chief’s aura – Tobirama hasn’t said anything about them, though, so she doesn’t mention it before they curl up into the warm bear skin he’d unsealed for them and go to sleep without incidence. 

When Asami wakes up after one of the strangest dreams she’s ever had, she’s clenched so tightly in Sensei’s arms that she can’t breathe, and the biggest cat she’s ever seen – a giant blue bakeneko much taller than even Madara-sama, who’s _super tall_ – is crouched at the mouth of the cave and blocking out all the light. 

She barely has a moment to recognize the overwhelming burning brightness of chakra so dense and powerful it’s nearly visible as energy that _must_ belong to a bijuu, and before she can even think anything else, Tobirama dismisses her. The Nibi vanishes from her sight, obscured by the black whorl of space-time. 

Asami is hurled back into her native den with enough force that she tumbles nose over tail right into her sister Tōji, who nips at her for waking her up so rudely but doesn’t get out a complaint before she notices the way her littermate’s kitten-pelt is spiked up with terror.

Fortunately, Kaa-chan steps in, gently gripping Asami by the scruff at her nape and lifting her clean off the ground so no one else is hit by her panicked flailing.

“Hnmsndfghskgnm,” says Kaida, words muffled by the mouthful of cub she’s carrying, but her tone is inquiring, and Asami thrashes around a bit until she’s let back down and can explain what just happened, even though she’s not really sure of that herself. Her return to the Eternal Winter is a rare enough occurrence that soon all of her siblings are tumbling out of the nest where they’d been curled up together – really, they’re getting way too big to all fit, Kaa-chan must have to tuck up into a tiny ball to make room – and flooding her with chattering questions and squeaks and battering paws.

They’re silenced quickly enough by the way Kaida physically sweeps them away from Asami with a single lash of her long, thick tail. She then settles down into a more comfortable crouch in front of her sole contracted cub and says, “Why have you returned to us in such a state, Peanut? Is Tobira-chan not ever content with you at his side? Hush, cub, take slower, deeper breaths and _explain_ what has you looking so frightened.”

“I-” Asami can’t quite get words out, but she has to at least _try_ , because any moment now her sensei could be ripped into shreds by the Nibi – oh, _that’s_ why the cave had been so familiar, but what was with that weird chakra coming from deeper in? – and not doing everything she can to help him is morally reprehensible.

“Tobirama met the Nibi!”

This statement is met with four small faces cast in disbelief and one larger face immediately hardening. She tries to say more, but without warning her mother scoops her up again and bounds through the den complex to the Leopard Chief’s stronghold at the craggy mountain peak.

When they finally arrive in Madara’s chambers – many times larger than most of the others so it can accommodate her properly – their Chief is perched on her overhang, tail thrashing back and forth and massive spotted shoulders braced against the wind. She turns her broad head to look at them, and there is no surprise on her face when she recognizes Asami.

She’s the Chieftain, of course – she has a link to Tobirama that is even stronger than Asami’s, and she knows the Two-Tails well, though she’s never explained exactly how or why. 

The handsome lines of her snout are frozen into deadly seriousness, and Asami’s stomach flops over and over. When she’s set back down on the ground, she doesn’t even bow – the moment her paw-pads hit the floor, she’s scrambling over to her own Clan Head and immediately starting to knead at a foot nearly as big as her mother.

“ _Madara-sama!_ Is Tobira-sensei going to be okay? Is he gonna be _eaten?_ Can you even do anything about it if he is? What if I didn’t make a good impression with the Nibi and she decides I’m bad at being a cat? What do I _do_?!” Kaida snaps out something scolding from behind her, but all of her attention is on Madara as the chief summons lowers her head to meet Asami’s gaze. Her left eye – the only part of her face that can be properly seen from this angle - is huge and steely green, and even though she’s filled to bursting with anxious questions, Asami can feel herself start to calm down and still under the comforting weight of her Chief’s heavy stare.

“Matatabi-sama will not eat Tobira-chan, no,” she rumbles, her voice making the cub’s entire body vibrate slightly and reverberating off the cavern walls before the sound disappears into the whiteout beyond the overhang. “She is just assessing him, for the now. It would appear that our esteemed Senju has decided to _interrogate_ a bijuu to gain more information on the whereabouts of his lost littermate.” There’s a pause, and the silence washes over Asami like a tidal wave. “He’s not making a good first impression.”

Kaida makes a noise of despair and buries her muzzle beneath her wide paws. Of _course_ he would, it’s _Tobirama_ ; _how_ could she have _ever_ expected him to employ any tact when he’s alone and defenseless at the mercy of the Two-Tails. It’s a wonder her human cub has survived to be as old as he is; she knows that Mizushi and Yuuki haven’t got a clue as to how he does it without them standing guard almost constantly to ensure no one tries to assassinate him for an unwise remark at the wrong time. 

Asami can’t bear to cling to Madara-sama anymore and bolts back into the security of Kaa-chan’s warm, soft underside, wriggling her way into her mother’s fur and trying not to think about how her sensei is gonna _die_ because he mouthed off to the _Nibi_ , which is _exactly_ the kind of thing he always scolds her for doing, but apparently nothing matters when it’s his own life on the line.

She’s absorbed enough in her despondency that she doesn’t notice the frantic tugging on her Summoning bond through the rest of her misery, nor does she notice the way the Leopard Chief suddenly unsheathes her scythe-like claws with the _shnnk_ of keratin on bare rock.

Somewhere back in Lightning Country, Senju Tobirama narrowly escapes the snarling jaws of the Two-Tails, and bolts for his life into the bowels of the tunnels, running until its enormous chakra signature burns like the sun several hundred meters back and he can be certain there’s no way it could follow without bringing the whole mountain down.

He keeps going, though, because the bijuu’s rage is no fleeting thing; stripped of gear and outerwear, he pads ever deeper into the winding cave system, unaware of the glowing yellow eyes watching him from every shadow or the bicolored Venus fly trap awaiting him in the heart of the mountain tunnels. 

 

[??????], [??????], POST-WARRING CLANS ERA

AN UNKNOWN AMOUNT OF TIME LATER

 

When Matatabi wakes from an unconsciousness she doesn’t remember dropping into, the first thing that registers in her hazed mind is the _emptiness_. Her connection to her fellow bijuu isn’t strong enough to give them true presence in her mind, but their shared mental plane is ever at the edge of her awareness, her siblings’ clashing energies a familiar hum of chakra. She’s so accustomed to just being able to dip into their plane whenever she wishes to that when she tries repeatedly to no avail, she’s distracted enough not to notice everything else.

When she does, she only narrowly avoids springing to her feet in outrage and shock – that may be helped by the massive black vines wrapped around her entire body, keeping her pressed flat and prone against the earth of…wherever the hell this place is.

Matatabi cannot only not contact the bijuu, she can’t sense _anything at all_ , and when she blinks her odd-colored eyes in some attempt to clear her vision, her surreal surroundings don’t change, and the information she’s getting doesn’t either.

She’s not bound by vines, she’s just trapped beneath the roots of an enormous tree that radiates the same corrupted chakra that’s been haunting her for years. It immobilizes her very effectively – many of the thick, limb-like roots that aren’t just wrapped around her so tightly they’d cut off circulation in any normal organism, some of them have pierced directly through her body and then buried in the ground beneath her. It must be using her as _fertilizer_ , she thinks numbly. Any attempt to channel her own energy – easier than breathing for a creature like her – just results in the tree absorbing the force and funneling it away. All of Matatabi’s breaks for freedom simply feed her living prison, making it stronger and herself weaker.

She stops struggling pretty quickly once she figures that out.

She can’t see much through the greyish roots of her cage, but she makes out an expanse of bare earth that suddenly drops away into the void. There is no sky; there are no stars; there is _nothing at all_ , and although Matatabi has no idea _how_ such a thing could have happened to her without her knowledge, she believes she’s trapped on some kind of demi-plane sealed away from the rest of existence altogether. 

Time passes. Matatabi doesn’t know how much – she has no awareness of the dimensions of her prison-space nor any means by which to measure them, and she spends as much time as she can dozing. Sleep seems to be the activity that feeds the jailing tree the absolute barest minimum of her chakra – it’s a fucking parasite and leeches her energy out, no matter what she does to keep herself from using any. 

She doesn’t have nightmares. She’s a bijuu, the Two-Tails, she _doesn’t have nightmares_ , but she can think of no other explanation for the strange visions that haunt her mind when she hibernates. Even as the root caps elongate and spread to take hold in her body, even as inch after excruciating inch forces its way into her like some network of vampiric external blood vessels, she dreams about flashes of a life that isn’t hers, echoed by emotions she’s never felt.

Matatabi doesn’t know why her subconscious has suddenly thrust her into the headspace of what appears to be a _human_ , some albino brat from Fire Country if she recognizes those oaks and the distant scorching corona of Kurama’s chakra. It’s irritating enough that she’s pretty sure this is that little rat _bastard_ who had the _nerve_ to demand things of her just because he successfully invaded her den without dying, but just plain confusing when parts of her knowledge overlap with his.

She _knows_ Madara, but _her_ Madara is the snow leopard Chieftain and a feline of at least _some_ measure of common sense, not a wild-eyed young man with a black mane that would embarrass any self-respecting lion and most _definitely_ not her _soulmate._

If she’s been swapped somehow with that human, well. She’ll never admit to having any shred of sympathy for him, because he’s a _human_ and a little _brat_ , but his Uchiha not-lover is certainly something. Matatabi would be lying if she said she didn’t want to crush him under her paws after just experiencing someone else’s fleeting memory of him; she can only imagine how much worse it would be to actually be Bonded to him, heart and soul.

Eventually the pain from the roots’ growth – they’re long enough to embed in her bones, now, and seem to be targeting the endless stores of chakra within her, to no apparent luck – keeps her from being able to sleep at all. Matatabi passes time by trying to guess at her tree’s species and examining the seals enclosing her – they _are_ seals, nearly unrecognizable as any kind of fūinjutsu at all and certainly stronger than anything she’s ever come across before, but still seals – to the best of her ability. It’s a limited success; she can gather that the tree’s oddly carnivorous behavior is the manifestation of a strange matrix that paralyzes her and is designed to cannibalize her energy to maintain itself. There is no apparent explanation as to why it bears such an unsettling resemblance to the weeds that have been taking root in Matatabi’s basement, but it does clarify one thing.

The humans really have succeeded in creating a seal capable of trapping Tailed Beasts within humans.

Matatabi wouldn’t believe it if she was any more like Son and actually prone to denying the obvious, but. She’s alone and imprisoned – apparently _within_ the albino human, which just fucking _figures_ – and the tree connects her life force to his but keeps her firmly suppressed and powerless. The seal is by no means complete; that Matatabi is conscious at all indicates it’s just barely finished enough to contain her, and definitely not enough to link her chakra reserves with those of her new pet human to an extent that would allow him to join them together without evaporating himself.

She would pray spitefully that he tries, but she knows that if he did, she would die as well, and Sage only knows how long it would take her to reform if she’s able to escape this pocket dimension at all.

The longer Matatabi spends becoming one with the tree, the more easily she can access the boy’s mind; she doesn’t care enough to actually learn anything about him, but she tries to peer through his eyes – good god his vision is _terrible_ – only to discover that _he_ seems to be trapped in a cell too, the few times he’s conscious and actually looking at things.

That sounds about right.

What Matatabi learns about being locked away and drained of power for no real reason is that it’s very, very _boring_. She relives her early days as a kitten in the Sage’s forest a dozen times over. She fails to sleep but still she dreams about helping a kunoichi she doesn’t know ink experimental fūinjutsu all over her skin using kinjutsu tattoo needles she never stole from the Uzushio archives. She’s back in her mountains, and then she’s holding off a slender young man with long dark hair and typical Uchiha features, trading insults and jutsus in turn. She remembers napping in the sunlight with her chin propped up on Chōmei’s smooth, shimmering carapace; she remembers being honored by Madara-sama as the first contractor ever to have the privilege of raising one of the snow leopards’ treasured cubs. She knows Madara as one of her oldest friends and the sharp-eyed, sharp-clawed warden of the Eternal Winter, and she knows a different Madara as her coveted soulmate, righteous and stunning and perfect and untouchable when he clashes maniacally with an overpowered anija who lacks Kurama’s nine tails.

It’s possible that years pass before the seal is finally altered and Matatabi is able to return to her own mind and safely partition herself from her host. Her personality blurs between Senju Tobirama and the Nibi no Bakeneko; when the roots finally retreat and she’s free to fall deep into a healing sleep, she doesn’t even bother to tug her abused limbs up against her body before she sinks into a welcoming darkness.

There are no dreams, this time. Matatabi floats idly in the depths of her own mind, unaware of everything and curled into herself as tightly as she can, her tails wrapped around her face to give her a semblance of privacy that she doesn’t technically need.

When she finally rises, she is healed almost completely. The tunnels dug into her flesh from the invasive growth of the tree have closed; her pelt burns high and bright in a dark, healthy cobalt; her tails are free and wave lazily behind her as they nearly always do.

Matatabi herself is not. There are stakes driven through all four of her paws and a heavy collar wrapped around her neck, and even though the new chakric chains connecting the restraints eat at her fur where they make contact, she is considerably more mobile than she had been, and is pleased to find herself unmuzzled.

She doesn’t focus on that, because standing on the precipice of her prison-space’s island is a human the color of snow, peering up at her with big red eyes and the posture of a mouse before a lioness.

She nearly bites his head off, but before she can close her jaws around him, her teeth scrape helplessly against an invisible barrier wrapped around his immediate person. When she brings her left forepaw as far forward as she can without tugging on the spike speared through it, her claws bounce and skid off of the same protective forcefield. The brat doesn’t so much as _flinch_ when assaulted by a bijuu; just blinks at her with a face she’s worn a hundred thousand times in her memories and has the gall to wait patiently like _she’s_ the impertinent upstart here. 

Matatabi would melt the flesh off his bones, but she wouldn’t want to waste her chakra on such a miserable little wretch.

Senju Tobirama – changed, now, from that last time she saw him through her own eyes, so many eternities ago – rubs one of his spidery human paws across his face and scratches idly at the slashes of crimson that now run across his cheeks and chin.

[Thank you,] he tells her, his voice strangely loud in the seal-space. [I _did_ manage to find my friend, although I doubt that was your intention. It turns out she’s been held as a prisoner by the Shogun, the same as me now, and you too, technically, which explains why I couldn’t locate her anywhere even when I stretched out my senses.]

He’d…that’s right, her last clear recollection is of this same human kitten interrogating her about the location of some kunoichi that had apparently disappeared in her territory some months ago. She’d tried to kill him too, then, for camping out in her den and kidnapping a leopard cub, but he’d escaped into the tunnels she hadn’t managed to clear of rot and –

That’s where her memory shorts out, and in lieu of giving the Senju kit any kind of response, she snorts ash in his face and is delighted to find that the force protecting him from direct blows does not, in fact, prevent her from just tossing him out into the void of the seal-space. 

Matatabi hadn’t noticed just how much heavier his presence was when he appeared before her until it vanishes, but she’s pleased to note that he doesn’t try again even as she realizes that this just means he’s retreating to plan.

The kitten is fully cognizant, now, in a way he hasn’t been since Matatabi awoke inside the seal, but she ignores spying on his reunion with the Lightning kunoichi in favor of exploring her floating island for the first actual time.

Her parasite tree is still there, but it’s growing sideways out of the side of the platform and only anchoring her newer restraints, not possessing her entire body, so she deigns to graciously let it remain for now (after wasting a solid hour or so just blasting at it with the strongest elemental strikes she can summon while still locked away). Matatabi isn’t _happy_ , exactly, when she realizes she has some vague estimate of time again – it still seems to pass strangely within her dimension, something not at all unusual in any variation of space-time.

…There’s honestly not much else; just bare, soft earth, the tree, and then the endless void of the not-space stretching into infinity even as it exists within the set boundaries of a storage seal.

Several days tick by as the kitten recovers from what was apparently a very trying ordeal – he’s been drawing on her chakra to keep his body from dissolving under the energy demands of the seal, which appears to have been haphazardly slapped together by a pair of barely-conscious teenagers – and he stews in his own misery, which isn’t quite so oppressive now that he has the newly-rediscovered Kyashi to share it with. 

Mito will be very, very glad to see her home and safe when they finally escape, Matatabi knows, but she doesn’t know Mito; the still-hazy barriers between her mind and Tobirama’s frustrate her endlessly with their continued permeability. 

Matatabi is just about to try and contact her siblings again when the kitten reappears on her island, accompanied this time by – is that the cub he’d had with him before? _How_ , exactly, did he manage to take foreign matter with him into the seal-space when he himself can’t even truly come? 

All thoughts of impossibilities fly out of her head when the tiny snow leopard – her entire body is smaller than Matatabi’s _nose_ – is set gently down to run free around in the dirt, and she is immediately transfixed by the blur of black and silver that slams into her paw with impressive force. 

[HELLO NIBI-SAMA!] yowls the cub – at least _someone_ knows how to show some damn respect – [YOU ARE VERY TALL! EVEN TALLER THAN MADARA-SAMA! WHAT DO YOU EAT TO BE SO TALL!]

Matatabi contorts herself so she can look down at the little leopard without also making eye contact with the human she’s been catnapped by. 

[ **i do not eat anything, small one,** ] she tells the cub, which is true. As a bijuu she requires no sustenance, and time alone is sufficient to heal any physical maladies she may suffer from. [ **i very much doubt there is a hunting ground in the world that could provide you with enough food for you to grow to my size, nor am i sure that you will ever do so.** ]

Matatabi regrets not lying almost instantly when the tiny spot of gray in her vision wilts against her paw and then slides bonelessly to the ground. [Nooo _ooooooo_ , Tobira-sensei said I could be as big as you and then _no one_ could keep me from eating as much ramen as I want even if I throw it back up! Senseiiiii, you _lied!_ ]

The boy – apparently he didn’t just steal a cub from the Sagelands, and he’s long since gotten himself signed to the snow leopards, Hagoromo only knows how _that_ happened – snatches his young ward back up and sets her over his shoulder, ignoring the small paws battering against his back.

[Peanut,] he reprimands her, gentle in a way she’s never known humans to be, [I said you could meet the Nibi if and only if you agreed to be _polite_. It was enough trouble bringing you into the seal-space at all, snowflake.]

Like he hadn’t broken into Matatabi’s own nest uninvited, demanded answers of her, and then locked her into his very soul and tortured her for what felt like centuries with a faulty seal. Kittens these days are so brave. So brave and so, so stupid.

Peanut is _not_ pleased with her summoner’s approach to manners and very vocally defends herself.

[I _was_ polite! How will Nibi-sama _hear_ me if I don’t yell or notice me if I don’t throw myself in front of her face? She’s very tall, Tobira-sensei, taller than _everyone_ but _you_ especially and apparently taller than I can ever be, so it’s very hard for me to get her focus! Right, Nibi-sama? Did I do okay?] 

Matatabi is a bijuu, progenitor of the deadliest storms the humans of Rai no Kuni have ever had to endure, and she has known no force more intense than the thousand-watt gaze of Peanut the cub, her tiny face set in determined expectancy and her little tail lashing back and forth. She doesn’t feel like the venerated Two-Tails right now so much as a poor, gullible schmuck who’s been tricked into fostering this small, compact hurricane, and the aloof coldness cultivated by her many centuries of life in the harshest corner of the world shatters like summer ice the moment a single kitten whips out a sad, pleading expression. 

[ **…you did alright,** ] she says, _not_ feeling vindicated by the little purr of delight that statement elicits from the human’s foundling. She will _not_ warm to the Senju because he’s violated all the rules of fūinjutsu and smuggled a baby into her seal-space. She is no mother, never has been and never will be; there is no rational reason for her to be so strongly affected by a few bare minutes of contact with Tobirama’s beloved Peanut. 

The boy leaves, taking his charge with him, and as soon as he does his memories filter into her head again. Matatabi spends the next four hours with her paws in Senju’s sandals, watching him receive a newborn Asami from Kaida, eyes barely opened. She sees the cub christened as Peanut and is floored to witness Madara – queenly, dignified Madara, who knows no fears and rules her portion of the Sagelands with iron claws – consent to the boy taking one of her own in to be raised as his primary personal summons.

Snow leopard cubs are rare and precious little creatures. All summoned spirits are different from regular animals; most of them age slower and possess supernatural powers and can endure conditions that may kill members of their mortal species, but it comes with a price. The mating season for most of the big cats only comes around once every two decades or so – Matatabi herself is mostly aware of Kaida and her litter because five cubs born at once, with one of them chosen by a human and all of the rest living to see a year of age? Completely unheard of. She’s still not sure what insanity possessed Madara to permit one of her signed humans to adopt a _cub_ , but it’s hardly her business. 

She curls up to nap when her jailor goes to sleep for the night and she stops receiving sensory input from the chains binding her to him. Matatabi would die before admitting that it, but it may be possible that the Senju has, by some random trick of fate, accidentally absorbed some of the good sense all cats possess, even if only by proxy. His move with the cub was _cheating_ , plain and simple, but nonetheless the Nibi has been thawed, if only just a bit. 

Weeks fly by and she becomes accustomed to the sensation of her seal-space changing as the seal is continuously altered to be more functional and efficient. She gradually gets used to the way she can constantly sense a being who isn’t her but is deeply connected to her in ways she can’t understand yet; she endures several more audiences with Senju and sits in on his conversations with the kunoichi, who seems to think the whole concept of bijuu seals is complete nonsense and never hesitates to say so, even as she sketches out sealing matrices meant to ease the burden he bears.

Matatabi frequently wonders why she wasn’t trapped inside the girl instead. Then, at least, she wouldn’t have to tuck her paws over her face to block out the inconvenient flood of _emotions_ the boy has nearly all the damn time concerning his human-Madara. 

She hates human-Madara on principle, but she _loathes_ him for taking up such an unreasonably large section of Senju’s headspace. She doesn’t know how to block out the _dreams_ he has, and the erotic ones – the _disturbing_ erotic ones, why have humans evolved to find such things _attractive_ \- aren’t even the worst part. It’s just pathetic, really, being forced to watch her prison guard fantasize about _holding hands_ with someone he can only love from afar. Almost as disgusting as it is when he confuses her more feline instincts with his teenage libido, resulting in some very _interesting_ scenarios that Matatabi wishes she could scourge from her memory banks.

Despite her best efforts to distance herself and hold on to her anger and spite, she still falls into complacency. She becomes too used to the hum of someone else’s thoughts underneath hers; she normalizes the rapid, fluttering beat of his small human heart. It isn’t _good,_ by any means – she still can’t get to her fellow bijuu and he gets the most asinine songs stuck in her head on loop for hours on end – but it could be worse. She can’t entirely keep herself separated from the brat and objective about his existence, not when she knows the way he melts when he sees a cat or his snorting giggle-laugh when his cellmate tells him a shitty joke.

It doesn’t last. Matatabi is rudely awoken from her most recent sleep by the feeling of the human ripping her chakra from her and messily stuffing it into his own coils, and before she can even think to reach out to him and snatch it back all contact between them is abruptly shut off. The tree’s blood-red leaves wither and dissolve, and the chains hiss as they eat away at her fur and bite into her skin. When the connection is finally reopened, Matatabi refuses to reach out to the human at all, and all she lets slip from her side of the seal is the vicious satisfaction she’ll feel when she finally reduces Senju Tobirama into dust, feline inclinations or no.

There is no being who can lie and belittle and steal from the Two-Tails and live to see tomorrow; the boy may very well be a human sacrifice, a jinchuuriki forced to bear her within him and suffer the demands of a poorly-adjusted seal, but _he will regret it_ , even if Matatabi has to kill herself in order to see him dead. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> for like. clarification. mats and tobes aren't actually a hivemind, but i dont really have any idea how to describe the bond between jinchuuriki and bijuu?? like tabs' seal-space is connected to tobirama's being but his mind and his chakra are most strongly anchored to it, and on tobirama's end matatabi can project things into his mind like a second subconscious
> 
> more will happen later that didnt happen now cause we don't get to see tobes's point of view but Dont Worry That Will Come....
> 
> Fucking Sorry Folks, tobirama's into petplay now. there was just nothing i could do about it :-( i am utterly powerless here :-(


	11. beg me for mercy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kyashi sits in a room and commits some crimes. Tobirama is gravely ill and has died several times already. Matatabi gets a name.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so i was googling random shit to help tie up plot holes as one will do sometimes and i found out about albino redwoods and absolutely fucking lost my shit cause thats literally perfect
> 
> theyre called ghost trees and theyre entirely parasitic. they are actual albinos, meaning they have no pigmentation and no chlorophyll, so they cannot do the one thing plants have to do to survive. they cant photosynthesize, so they take advantage of The Redwood Way - all the plants will connect their root systems so the trees can share nutrients and minerals and sugars and keep all the members of a grove alive and healthy. albino trees are alive because of this; they feed off of the hard-earned food of other trees, but they also absorb nearly all of the heavy metals and dangerous shit in the soil. its like rent. albino trees have many times the lethal amount of certain toxins in their leaves but theyre comin out the cage and still doin just fine, which i for one think is Very sexy and also interesting and unbelievably convenient
> 
> matatabi's tree is an albino redwood (lmao actually i wrote it as a wierwood like from game of thrones and that's still cool so im gonna keep it but how fucking rad is it that this shit is real sort of). she and tobi feed it their own energy and chakra and it's like....a visual manifestation of the seal, sort of. the seal is a real living thing and actively demands the energy to maintain itself that it cant produce on its own, and in return it like. functions. also meaning that the more sophisticated additions that are yet to come that will improve the seal itself are like auxillary extra special shit - the existence of the seal keeping tabs In is the absolute deadline priority, and if it runs out of energy to support everything else, that's the one thing it will support until it just can't anymore. it Used to be feeding off of both matatabi and tobi directly since kyashi hadn't figured out how to make it both functional and actually something you could live with, but once that happened everything was sort of rearranged and more healthy and shit
> 
> theyre called ghost trees and i am so fucking pumped about this like yall dont even KNOW. im going hog fucking wild cause bitch thats the god tree!!! doesnt do shit by itself, ruins other people to stay alive,, very big and sinister,, wack as Fuck, i LOve that.
> 
> for reference: kyashi's hearing aids are disabled within the prison and the lighting is bad enough that reading lips goes from being kind of a pain in the ass to What's The Point, so Tobi signs his conversation for her and she speaks out loud for him, cause his eyesight sucks. disability teens, here to care
> 
> i want to have the homecoming chapter up in time for tobirama's birthday so lets say he's the only one who's not at least 18 yet (barring peanut) for now cause if i remember right ... its february 19, and according to my enormous huge galaxy brain, today is not february 19
> 
> i have rewritten this so many times like i had an acceptable amount of words ready a few days ago but UnForTunately i hated it so it died. here it is now!! i think!! and i like it, which is good n not just posting something and hoping i like it more later. ive come around to chap 10 but she's still on thin ice

IN THE SUBTERRANEAN DUNGEON, MIZU NO KUNI, POST-WARRING CLANS ERA

DURING THAT WINTER

 

It takes Kyashi four months to betray everything she’s ever learned about the sealing arts; four months to disrespect the effort her senseis had put into teaching her their special, coveted jutsus; four months, even with her dragging it out as long as she can, to finish creating the bijuu seal. 

It’s a _nightmare_. A horrific, parasitic curse of a thing that bastardizes any and all pre-existing storage seals unfortunate enough to have inspired it. It is experimental, it is deadly, and perhaps most importantly, it is _permanent_ – whatever poor soldier the Zetsus bring to her to receive this thing, they’ll be stuck bearing it upon them for life.

During the rare occasions when exhaustion overwhelms everything else and she finally sleeps, the hum of corrupted chakra and sweeping lines of red seal-script haunt her subconscious. It’s entirely possible she’s hallucinating the hissing noises her notes make when she reviews them – she doesn’t really eat, or drink, or do much of anything beyond clawing uselessly at herself with bitten-off nails and staring at the wall – but it still seems to Kyashi that the Seal of Tartarus is spiting her, somehow, for bringing it into existence.

She honestly can’t blame it.

There have been a few trials. Enemies of the state, mostly, brought before her by the demons to be marked with the Tartarus Seal and then studied afterwards. Three men, so far, and all of them died within a week. The first one’s name was Kazunori, she thinks; he was one of her samurai guards, back before the Zetsu made enough clones to keep them watching her all the time. The crime he’d been sentenced for, the act that brought him back to the dungeons as a lab rat, had been talking to her, bringing her real food and cold, fresh water, telling her about his lover who’d been stationed in Earth Country, mimicking the trilling chirps of the young birds he rescues and rehabilitates. 

For her eighteenth birthday, she gets to watch the look on his face as she stabs red ink into his chest. The others blurred together, after that, but she still hasn’t forgotten the way he _smiled_ at her, thanked her for trying so hard to resist the monsters; the way he died with blood and chakra dripping out of his chest cavity, her hands wrapped around his heart and all of her power failing to keep it beating.

When the black-and-white Zetsu speaks to her about its plan with Shiro of the Sharingan by its side, Kyashi doesn’t see them. She looks up into the faces of her captors from her corner in the shadows and sees the warm expression of Kazunori, the first person to have shown her any measure of kindness in _months_. She sees her beloved Mito, red hair shining and eyes crinkled in laughter, never really smiling again because Kyashi couldn’t keep her promise. She sees Senju Tobirama, their third wheel and favorite little bastard, cooing precociously at his Peanut with the bright Uzushio sun burning him pink. She sees a hundred thousand futures that will never come to be, and when she closes her eyes, her Vision Fourfold still plucks at her skull, whispering would-be could-be should-be over and over and over again until she wonders if she’s really been possessed by the Zetsu this whole time or if she’s just going insane.

She doesn’t hear Shiro talking at her about what she’ll be expected to do next. Of course, she doesn’t ever hear much of anything, not since that one mission in Wave Country, but for all that it’s given her some access to her chakra, it refuses to allow her to activate her hearing aids – salt in a festering wound – and it also refuses to sign for her so that she can understand what it says. Kyashi’s glad for that, actually. She can close her eyes and the world falls away; just the darkness and the silence and the coolness of nowhere, her ever-erratic memory erasing her unwilling knowledge of all that was and is and ever will be. It’s the only rest she gets here anymore – she thought that maybe when she completed Tartarus, they’d let her go, but that doesn’t seem to be the case.

Kyashi is meditating, focusing on the unnatural darkness of her Bond and trying to nurture it back to wakefulness when the first viable jinchuuriki candidate is deposited in her cell to join her in her misery. 

When she rises that evening to see the face of _Senju Tobirama_ , of all people, twisted in pain and deathly-pale, she briefly thinks she’s finally cracked, and she dozes off again. When she wakes up a few hours later to discover not only that yes, he really is there in the flesh and everything, but that he’s got the _Two-Tails_ locked crudely into his chakra coils and kept there by a straitjacket of fossilized vines, she wastes a good thirty minutes considering the possibility that the Dokuzetsu just wants to punk her.

It’s only when Senju starts seizing, iridescent blue sweat dripping down his temples and his circulatory system clogged with foreign chakra that Kyashi actually gets down to business and starts to seal the bijuu into him before he dies like this.

He’s gonna die anyway, more likely than not, but there’s a minute chance, the slenderest odds he might survive this, so she doesn’t really have a choice at all.

Sucks for you, Tobirama, Kyashi thinks gravely, taking out the tattoo needles she’s been refusing to acknowledge for the past two weeks. This may cause some pain, so brace yourself.

True to form, he ignores her and does not brace himself – Kyashi disregards the fact that he’s _unconscious_ and running a 106º fever and could not possibly realize she’s even there in the first place – and when she slices open the nearly-translucent skin on his chest, he screams like he’s being exorcised. He isn’t. This is the exact _opposite_ of an exorcism.

“Silly Senju,” Kyashi tells him, because months of imprisonment have driven her to talk to everything, especially things that can’t listen, “I’m _making sure_ the demon _stays_ inside you. Ha, I’m Binding you to the _Two-Tails_ , so _when_ you’re awake again, I can make as many catboy jokes as I damn well want to and you will be _powerless_ to stop me since I’m _right._ ”

Tobirama, who is still not capable of processing most stimuli, does not answer this, but that’s hardly new. Scrolls and ink aren’t very chatty, either, and they’ve been Kyashi’s primary conversation partners for a truly disturbing amount of time now.

What disgusts her the most about the whole process of inking the Seal of Tartarus into the still-kicking corpse of her best friend is that she didn’t get the chance to sterilize anything beforehand. This is the same small room she’s been _living in_ for over half a year – her bed is right over there, and only the Sage knows what kind of pathogens are breeding in it even as she sleeps there – and this is quite possibly the worst location imaginable for this specific procedure.

The Nibi’s chakra keeps _Tobirama_ safe, at least. Kyashi starts to get frostbite when she stays too close for too long, and though the bijuu-aura seems to be the only thing keeping him alive right now, it’s also the single biggest obstacle for him to continue staying alive. She believes it’s a sign, the latest of millions telling her just what a bad idea trapping gods into little rat humans is, but she _knew that already_. She’s known that the whole damn time, and it’s not gonna start mattering _now._  

Even as Kyashi cuts and inks and wipes clean incisions until she’s decently sure she’s given herself carpal tunnel, even as the Nibi thrashes within its boundaries and nearly slices her fingers off several times, even as Tobirama’s weak pulse stills too many times in a row, she’s the most relaxed she’s been in _months._  

It takes three entire days of near-constant labor, two pints of chakra-treated ink, and no less than thirty-seven close encounters with death, spread pretty evenly among all of the individuals and ancient forces of nature involved, for the central sealing matrix to be completed.

It’s a twelve-pointed star, shimmering in a million different colors. Centered at Tobirama’s sternum, it winds outward in increasingly complicated fractals and concentric shapes, hiding almost all of his bony chest beneath red ink and giving Kyashi a ferocious migraine when she gets too close to it or stares at it for too long.

It _may_ be possible that she wasted pointless effort ensuring that it looks cool, but _damn,_ it looks _cool._ If Senju wakes up – _when_ he wakes up – Kyashi will brook no complaints that she didn’t put in every ounce of energy she had into making sure the results are as good as can be. Ignoring, of course, the thought running through the back of her head insisting that the seal itself might be more functional if she had put that same effort into actually _designing_ it, because Kyashi is an _artist_ and if Tobirama must suffer for aesthetics’ sake, then damn it, _Tobirama will suffer_.

The Tartarus Seal is technically complete, now. She has to run interference and oversight for the rest of the week to ensure that the fresh wounds heal properly and that the new chakrawork settles the way it should, but the Nibi’s energy doesn’t seem to be quite so vicious, now. At least momentarily, the seal is actually _working_.

It’s not enough. Kazunori made it to this point, too – the being she was sealing inside him as a test was one of the Zetsu clones, and he’d managed to survive to this point, but hadn’t lived any longer than that before the demon crawled its way out of his ribcage and mauled him with her just watching helplessly and trying to run interference. If she wants to ensure Tobirama avoids that same fate, which she does, if only so that she doesn’t have to see that happen again, she has to anchor both Tartarus and the Two-Tails to all of his tenketsu points and major chakra vessels, which will be hundreds of tiny seal markings and long lines of script connecting them and aligning the flow of energy. 

When Kyashi is finished with that, it should enable the bijuu and the human to coexist and share chakra between them – she can’t not have that last part, since the Nibi’s vitality has literally brought Tobirama back to life several times and kept his corpse from decaying when it couldn’t. Right now he’s breathing, if shallowly, but if she takes away his life support, that will stop quickly enough. 

Kyashi blinks drowsily at her new cellmate and his new parasite, opening her eyes fully just so she can glimpse briefly into this future, just to see if he makes it, and when the Vision Fourfold hums to life with a positive assurance that her efforts are not in vain, she collapses on her mound of blankets and sleeps dreamlessly.

She’s awoken by the scent of blood to the sight of Senju cloaked in a shroud of bubbling natural chakra, his long fingers sharpened into claws and his eyes turned green and yellow and deathly empty. There are fresh scratches running down his face and across his shoulders and arms – thankfully none compromising the already questionable integrity of the Tartarus Seal – and when Kyashi sits up, the monster _snarls_ at her in an inhumane pitch that scrapes painfully against her shattered eardrums. 

Tobirama, if he’s still alive somewhere, isn’t here right now. She’s looking into the hard, black eyes of the Nibi no Bakeneko, tailless and trapped in a strange place in a strange way with a strange person, and it is _furious_.

[ ** _you,_** ] the bijuu growls at her, its voice so low and loud that Kyashi feels the sound more than hears it. [ **what have you _done_ to us.**]

Two long, blue-black tails made of natural chakra so dense and powerful it’s nearly solid whip out behind Not-Tobirama, and for what is not first time and will definitely not be the last, Kyashi wonders just what fit of madness possessed the Zetsu to make it think that trifling with the Tailed Beasts is anything other a terrible idea. No death could be more certain, she thinks, staring at the Nibi as it advances on her with outstretched talons, or more _foolish._

 

ROUGHLY ONE WEEK LATER

 

Tobirama thinks he might be dead. He feels like he’s sick, only he’s had a 106-degree fever for weeks on end; his immune system is very weak, so it’s not unusual for him to be hit hard by common illnesses, but something this severe should have just killed him by now.

He drifts in and out of delirium, never fully recognizing or remembering the soothing balm of the chakra that watches over him or the cool touch of hands running along his face and down his neck.

His head and chest _burn_ , but in a different way than the familiar blistering of Madara and his wildfire energy – this is so hot it’s _cold_ , destroying his nerve endings and running like winter lightning just beneath his skin. It takes control of his muscles, paralyzing him when he tries to move and jerking at his limbs when he tries to stay still. His extremities are almost entirely numb, but sometimes they’ll sting fiercely in a manner indicative of frostbite.

Tobirama dreams about the Two-Tails. Its massive snarling face fills his emptied head – he may be going insane, since recurring visions seem to put him into its actual _body_ , but it’s privately wonderful, seeing the bracing snowy silence of the mountains from such a high perspective. He might be getting addicted to the sensation of bunching his muscles for a leap and _flying_ up into the air, propelled by four legs instead of two, and landing half a country from where he’d started with a cat’s liquid grace. 

Sometimes, he’ll imagine he hears yowling in the deepest pits of his subconscious, but whenever he listens for the sounds, all he hears is white noise.

He’s not sure how long he spends in a fugue state, not _quite_ comatose but certainly not conscious either – although he recognizes, distantly, that his continued ability to _think_ must mean that whatever brain damage he has didn’t compromise his higher cognitive functions, he’s unable to connect _himself_ to his _body._ There’s a rift between his brain activity and his physical self that was never there before, and he has no idea how to cross it, let alone resume control of his own senses.

Tobirama endures the feeling of his body degrading under the overwhelming flood of a foreign energy he just can’t place, even as that same energy is likely the only thing keeping his soul from just drifting into the afterlife. He wonders what would happen, if that was the case and the mysterious power just retreated.

He discovers that he can very much still have nightmares, and when he wakes for the first time in a very long time, it is with sweat freezing on his skin and his brothers’ names on his lips. 

There’s a flash of chakra that he’s _sure_ he knows from some place, but just as soon as he thinks he might be able to recognize it, he goes back under.

That remains a pattern for a little while. Tobirama will _almost_ gain consciousness, spurred on by what visions he has of a human life he’s _certain_ is his, and then sent back into sleep by that force that’s always watching him.

He dreams that he’s lost in nowhere, sitting before the Two-Tails and trying to talk to it, only to get himself hurled into the abyss. It feels strangely real, but when he tries to focus on what memories he should have of it, all he can find is a gleam of blue-black-red and a starburst of gold in his peripheral vision.

After an unbearable amount of time that could have been seconds or months or years, he well and truly wakes up to the sensation of the foreign chakra condensed into lines splitting into his skin and the sight of a face he’s been searching for in the most ungodly weather conditions known to man.

“God, you fucking _bastard_ ,” Kyashi snarls, sounding not unlike the Nibi had in his hundred ghostly memories of it. Tobirama graciously ignores the tears glimmering in her eyes in favor of trying to blink away the liquid blurring his own vision, and he doesn’t quite see her coming before there are too-thin arms wrapped around him so tightly that his ribs creak. He tries to bury his face in her wiry silvery hair, but the moment his nose gets close enough to touch it comes alive with pain. When Kyashi pulls back to glare at him properly there’s a smear of brownish red across the top of her head, and Tobirama is awake enough to wonder if she’d broken his nose at some point for some injury she didn’t want to wait to avenge.

“Guunghg buhn mahnin,” Tobirama tries to say, his heartfelt expression of joy warped into incomprehensible gibberish by his bruised nose and his still-sloppy control of his own tongue. She raises an eyebrow at him, obviously wondering if he’s going to translate, and he does his best to sign a greeting at her, but his fingers are clumsy and she waves him down, hands flickering rapidly through a statement he’s not quite cognizant enough to catch.

In true form, his confused moaning is ignored and his intelligence repeatedly insulted as he gets a brief summary of the _very interesting_ boring things Kyashi’s been doing while missing and presumed dead.

“Shut up or I’ll break your nose again, and when I’m finished not even Uchiha Madara will want to love you,” she tells him, a statement shared with all of the subtlety of her flashiest Raiton and one that leaves him staring mutely at her in shock. He would try to protest, but he realizes he’s shirtless and that she’s undoubtedly seen the Mark he’s somehow managed to hide from her for over a decade. She smacks him lightly on the shoulder when he tries to act surprised, and he refocuses on the soft sound of her voice in the darkness. “You gave us all a good scare, yeah? Even the Zetsu was worried – well, _sort_ of, mostly it was screechy - and it doesn’t care about anything, except, like, eating people, and maybe eyes. I know an eye fetish is kind of weird – wait, who am I talking to, you’ve been hooked on an _Uchiha_ for the entire time we’ve known each other, haven’t you? How’s it feel to be horny for the Sharingan?” “-kubyajjhh, ids nahd m’ _farrlt_ —” “I can’t _hear_ you, dumbass, but I’m taking that to mean it’s very bad, which I could have figured out on my own. They dragged you in here looking like a literal corpse, as in you were fucking _dead_ for an honestly impressive amount of time, but you’re up and about now like a proper zombie, even though that’s thanks more to the Nibi than anything else.” 

What.

“Whhabud,” Tobirama gasps out, slightly more articulate than the average sloth. He’s _definitely_ concussed; he hasn’t tried to _speak_ to his friend so clumsily since her hearing loss happened in the first place, but he’s having a hard time just processing what she says and she’s fully capable of extrapolating from his expressions. “Whhaboud a _Nee_ - _bee_?”

Kyashi doesn’t pause from where she’d been gently stretching out red-stained hands with excruciating popping noises, but she does bother to look up and turn her eyes to him. In the dim lighting they glow like molten gold, and they’re the only features he can pick out from her face in the shadows.

“Did…you’re a _sensor_ , you haven’t figured that out yet? Ah, you haven’t, um – I…how do I say this…”

Tobirama is trying very, very hard not to spiral into a complete panic attack, and succeeding, but only because his brain has stalled on Kyashi’s implication that _a bijuu saved his life_ and isn’t getting over it.

He remembers wearing fiery blue fur and sharp white fangs; he remembers the feeling of radiation poisoning slipping through his bloodstream and not killing him; he remembers the enormous mismatched eyes of a titan pinning him in place in that cave so long ago; he remembers the sound of his own voice, impossibly loud within his own seal, and when Kyashi speaks again, it all falls into place.

“…So you’re like…a jinchuuriki, now, I guess, that seems like a nice enough word for it, and what it all boils down to is: a plant demon dragged you in here looking like hell served cold with the Two-Tails bound very sloppily to you, not even with seals, _that_ was a mess, and long story short I accidentally betrayed everything the fūinjutsu masters on Uzushio ever taught us and kind of sealed a bijuu into your soul.”

Tobirama gapes at her. If his mouth isn’t open, it’s only because he’s lost the ability to move a single muscle in his body, which – which now contains _the Nibi_ , and…he’s still _alive?_

“…That’s impossible,” Tobirama signs very cautiously, and then abruptly takes it back, because Kyashi snorts derisively in his face – a rather bold move, coming from someone who just informed him she essentially Bonded him to a _monster_ – and he wearily remembers that the Uzumaki don’t _believe_ in impossibilities. 

Her face softens, then, because he’s still not processing anything. He might be going into shock, actually, which isn’t… _great_ , and she grasps at one pale hand – skeletal, now, thanks to the extended period of time he apparently spent being _dead_ – and points out the new additions he hadn’t noticed. Delicate red sealing lines now run from his fingertips all the way up his arm, and there’s an insanely complicated matrix covering his chest, connected to countless more lines that seem to spread across his entire body. 

“I can’t really do anything more for you beyond this point, Tobes,” she murmurs, tracing her long fingers down the fūinjutsu tattoos. “The rest of it – talking to the Nibi, if you can, keeping it safely inside the lines I’ve already drawn, learning about it, actually _living_ with it – that’s up to you now.” She’s the only person on Uzushio to have mastered this specific kinjutsu, combining her knowledge of seals with the Lightning Country tradition of inking one’s body to commemorate life events. He thinks he ought to be glad that the person who trapped the Nibi in him was a kunoichi of her caliber, but he doesn’t feel much of anything.

He stares down at the slashes of crimson – in the poor lighting, against his own deathly-pale skin and the deep mahogany tone of Kyashi’s, they almost seem like open wounds, even though the tattoos are nearly healed. That chakra is still there, confined to the lines of the seal matrix – now that he searches for it, he can feel it, a network of specially-treated tattoos spiderwebbing across his body, laid over his circulatory and nervous systems like drawn-on tenketsu lines. It’s condensed, but it doesn’t hurt, not the way it had before he’d come back to himself. Tobirama is _aware_ of the Two-Tails’ life force coursing through his body along with his own, but for now, at least, they can exist simultaneously, even though he has no doubt that there will still be some changes to be made.

It’s another little while before he’s got enough control over his own numbed hands to have a proper conversation with Kyashi, but when he can, she informs him about his new seal – apparently something she’d been forced to develop during the months she’d spent in this place – and gives him a short little introductory tour of their shared holding cell.

It’s both too much and not enough – roughly the size of the main room back in Tobirama’s old, long-abandoned apartment, it’s a surprisingly tidy space, and he’s pleased to realize that as far as prisons go, this one is fairly luxurious. Kyashi has her own nest-like futon, which would probably be neater if she cared at all about making her bed, but she has a mattress and blankets and even _pillows_ \- she graciously offers to share them with him on the stipulation that he’ll be turned out into the unforgiving cold if he tries to steal her sheets. There’s an actual en-suite bathroom, small but clean, supplied with a few bars of soap and running water. Kyashi lets him know that she is given enough untainted food and drink to have not lost too much weight; she’s pretty naturally wiry, but even after months in jail, she’s not been reduced to skin and bone, and though the clothes she’s been provided with are modeled after civilian wear, they’re made of fine silk and seem to be quite comfortable.

Tobirama himself is very thankful for the oversized yukata she lends him – he’d abandoned all of his supplies in the Nibi’s cave when he’d run away from it, and all he has on him now is a threadbare pair of standard shinobi pants and his good winter socks.

It’s been a _while_ since the two of them have shared a bed – even when they were young enough to do so, Kyashi almost always stayed with Mito and Tobirama was more often than not cuddled into his summons – and the first night he’s fully awake is not one where either of them gets much sleep. 

“Oh my god, Senju, if you stick your frozen fucking elbows into my side _one more time—_ ”

“ _Shut up_ , witch, usually I have Peanut to curl up with and she’s warm and fuzzy and soft, and you haven’t moisturized your back in _years_ , apparently, it’s practically _scaly_ over here. I’m not gonna snuggle up to some _lizard_ —”

“Maybe if you actually talk to your new best friend, it’ll keep you warm enough with, you know, its infamous fiery being to stop you from taking all the _fucking_ blankets just like I _explicitly_ warned you not to—”

“—The Nibi says it isn’t a space heater, and if you suggest that I use it like one, it’ll do its best to gut you.”

“It already _tried_ that, dumbass, you weren’t awake for it, and if you’re gonna pull the whole ‘bijuu of my twisted mind’ bullshit you might as well use its actual _name_. Go to _sleep_ before I make you, bitch, or at least let _me_ do so. Some of us are tired from saving the lives of ungrateful morons and would very much appreciate some rest.”

Tobirama is seventeen years old, nearly eighteen if he’s got an accurate grasp of time, and for the first time in his almost two decades of life he realizes that the Tailed Beasts may have real, actual _names_. 

There’s an angry growling from the back of his head that serves to prove this theory right, and by the time Kyashi has stopped spearing him in the stomach with the fucking menaces that are her bony knees, Tobirama is relaxed enough to dive back into his seal.

He’s only done it a few times so far, the most successful meeting to this moment being the one where he’d managed to Summon Peanut into the seal-space using his Bullheaded Determination no Jutsu, and when he opens his eyes, the seal appears before him as it always had, vaguely blurry and largely bare and almost entirely occupied by the only being it contains.

The Two-Tails is sprawled lazily before him, registering to his poor vision as a giant blue bakeneko larger than a building, and when he tries to step up to it and greet it, it exhales a long plume of smoke in his face that leaves him coughing.

[ **it’s embarrassing.** ] it says to him, narrowing its enormous heterochromatic eyes down at where Tobirama has collapsed against the God Tree. [ **it has by my estimation been nearly a month since we were first sealed together by your kunoichi and somehow you only figure out i am a being in my own right when _she_ points it out to you. can you really call yourself a ninja, brat?**] 

Tobirama’s temper is lit up by the condescending tone it uses, but when he looks up into the grave lines of its massive face, all of the fight bleeds out of him. Mito would _scalp_ him if she found out he got the chance to meet – well, was bodily forced to meet the Nibi, without much of a say in the matter - and didn’t even _introduce_ himself.

This is the most powerful being he is likely to ever meet, and he’s just been _ignoring it_.

When he meets the bijuu’s eyes, there’s an indecipherable sparkle in them that hadn’t been there before, like the bakeneko has been waiting for him to remember the basic basics of the manners Butsuma had drilled into him as a child and is just _disappointed_ that it’s taken him so long to do so.

Tobirama shoves down the irritation that bubbles up in his gut at the idea that _anyone_ is patronizing him, and he drops into a formal bow, the touch of his forehead to the ground sending sparks of feeling flickering along the lines of his seal.

[Nibi-sama,] he begins, remembering the respectful manner Peanut had used to address the Beast, wondering how and _why_ she’d never cared to inform him that there was a code of conduct he should be following, [I apologize for my actions and what harm they have caused you. I swear on my name – Tobirama of the Senju Clan – that I have no malicious will or intent to abuse your powers or purposely disrespect you, and that any past instances of me doing so have been caused by my own unawareness.]

There’s sweat dripping down his temples and blood rushing to his head. Is it even _possible_ to sweat in a dimension that technically doesn’t exist? He’s not sure, but the longer the Two-Tails keeps its silence, the worse he feels. After an agonizing few minutes drag by and Tobirama is finally starting to think that the bijuu is just going to withdraw whatever mercies it had extended to him up to this point, it finally speaks, so softly that he thinks he might be imagining it. 

[ **matatabi. my _name_ is matatabi, brat, and _stop_ calling me _it._ you are connected to me as i am to you. if you ever want anything to come from the circumstances fate has forced upon the two of us, you ought to remember that.**]

Tobirama’s neck aches when he pulls himself upright and he’s just about to flood the Nibi – Matatabi, _her name_ is _Matatabi_ – with the questions crowding his head when she brings one enormous paw down upon him and slams him back out into his own body.

When he finally falls asleep that night, limbs tangled in Kyashi’s and his soulmark blazing merrily, he dreams that he was born from the Ten-Tails alongside eight siblings, and his brain struggles to connect the similarities between his anija Kurama and his _real_ anija Hashirama, who is tailless like all humans but still shines brighter than the sun could ever hope to.

Matatabi’s habitual growling is quieter after that. Tobirama may be hallucinating it, but he’s pretty sure that when he looks deep into himself, the Nibi is there too, and she is not quite so angry as she had been, not quite so quick to rage when he frustrates her with his humanity.

After enough time, he thinks he hears purring instead of snarling, thinks that the frozen heat of her chakra is soothing instead of painful, but he’s probably imagining it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im gonna start writing the end notes after i actually finish the chaptré so lets see how this goes
> 
> if anyone wants 2 know then kyashi is deaf bc of That One Time she almost drowned in wave country. the thing abt barotrauma is humans are soft and squishy and easily broken SO. she Didn't Drown, but ear machine fucking broke, and she's only on active duty some of the time bc she gets spells of vertigo so bad she can't stand up. a fun fact about her vision fourfold, is it's secretly a homestuck reference, and if i keep fucking putting these in here i'm going to be murdered by god as penitence for my crimes. she can like.....see Across the time, into Other Timelines and sometimes even in2 the Future, but using it for anything beyond like a split-second glance of anything at all forces her to have horrible migraines as payment for her crimes against the plot. the vision fourfold mostly functions as an unnaturally accurate hindbrain instinct - she knew beforehand that going on her mission was a shit idea because of it but that sign couldn't stop her because she can't read - and it has a limited application in battle as being the predictive sharingan but better. the only reason kyashi hasnt been fucking murdered for being herself is cause she's got a pretty good idea of what will get her killed and what won't etc
> 
> matatabi's opinion of tobirama right now is that he's a sugar baby gold digger. he's trying to sweet talk her into being his friend but all he wants is the fucken uhhh BijuuPower, which isn't really true but is also sort of true, and that will cause all sorts of problems
> 
> i was gonna make this longer but then it didnt happen lmaoooo....idk how to feel abt this but for the now it's Acceptable and i've gone long enough w/o updating. ill respond to comments in a bit my mom is yelling at me to get breakfast
> 
> also like the prison is clean by people standards but you wouldn't perform surgery in your living room because fuck no so it's still a bad place to get tattooed. stay safe kidz


	12. admit you were toxic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hashirama has a very eventful day and endures a variety of very strong emotions. Mito is unwell, and this may or may not have something to do with how she believes her soulmate, who isn't dead, to be dead. Madara ignores his paperwork to play with his nephew and receives a very bold proposition. Izuna has a date with his Juliet and is the envy of every young woman in 1950s America.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my computer (read: me and my dumb clumsy hands) fucked up and deleted the notes id already had and im hulk smashing. im so close to snapping
> 
> warnings for this chapter: mention of pregnancy and some description of miscarriage
> 
> theres kagami now and spoilers: i love him.
> 
> also on the timelines: ik kakuzu doesnt try to assassinate hashirama until after he's already hokage and that technically, the villages began w konoha, but also i dont care so that's not gonna happen here. the smaller countries were less involved in the wars in the first place and enough time has passed that continuing to fight Just Because is both stupid and unsustainable, so the shinobi clans have a tentative ceasefire and work together with existing civilian cities to build a mutually beneficial relationship. kakuzu is adopted and has no clan, which is very important to me bc that was originally kyashi too before i accidentally slipped up and gave her a clan and i dont think i can just go back and get rid of that. it's possible to have power and be strong if you do not come from power and strength, and i'm not really sure exactly how to express this in a fic featuring characters that are literally all from famous old op clans. senju hashirama has NO RIGHTS and people who don't have the mokuton are so valid bc of it
> 
> no jailbirds this time bc i think ive written about them too many times in a row. i dont know whats gonna happen next but im certain it will be batshit wild cause things really do be like that
> 
> kakuzu is being trained as the prospective heir to his adopted clan and in order for him to prove himself to be strong and capable enough to lead, strong enough to wield the earth grudge fear (he's the first person in generations to be compatible with the kinjutsu despite being like a random baby someone found in a dumpster), he has to kill hashirama senju, As A Test Of His Abilities. also if he can steal that heart in particular not only will he have the mokuton but he'll have the full power of the fucking god of shinobi which. madara who? kaguya who? There's Only This Rich Bich and his off-brand hashiboob. he might be made like the waterfall hokage if that happened but. spoilers. it doesnt and he's cast away from taki society for failing to do the impossible, which makes him understandably a lil bit grumpy
> 
> toka is a greaser and izuna dies whenever she gives him her leather jackets. he doesnt need them he's just whipped

NEAR THE SOUTHERN BORDER WITH FIRE COUNTRY, TAKI NO KUNI, POST-WARRING CLANS ERA

EARLY FEBRUARY

Senju Hashirama leaves his week-long conference with the shinobi Clan Heads of Waterfall Country feeling much lighter than he has in a very, very long time. This winter has been almost unusually busy, but there are plenty of extenuating circumstances making it so. Mito’s pregnant, and as delighted as that makes him, she herself is _extremely_ displeased with the growing limitations placed on her chakra usage as time passes. Apparently, the life signature of their baby in her stomach disrupts her ability to sense her Bond, something that’s been spotty since they married but hasn’t improved over time. Tōka _still_ hasn’t forgiven him for exiling Tobirama and refuses to listen to anything he says unless it’s about sending out search parties and the like. Madara has been unreasonably explosive lately, and the last time Hashirama asked (very compassionately and not at _all_ patronizingly!) if he was alright, he’d gotten a flaming dragon to the face.

His bangs still haven’t grown back properly, and Mito laughs at him every time he mopes about it.

If that wasn’t enough, there’s also the job of strong-arming the elders into at least _considering_ a ceasefire with the Uchiha. Mito would do it, and likely do it excellently as she does all things, but the council dismisses her words, no matter how eloquent, and Hashirama isn’t exactly _good_ at politics. 

He’s alright, certainly – he has to be if he wants to survive as Clan Head – but his method of problem-solving tends to manifest more as brute force than anything else, and if he wants to finally get his peace, he can’t exactly use violence to make it happen.

The invitation to come to Waterfall Country had been more than welcome, and after seeing the way of life there he’s so full of sunny enthusiasm for what his own future might bring that it’s a wonder he doesn’t just explode from sheer excitement. 

The smaller countries like Taki are inhabited by their fair share of shinobi Clans and communities just like Hi no Kuni and the others, but they lack the numbers and resources to continue waging reckless war in the manner of the Uchiha and Senju. To preserve the survival of already-decimated Clans, enemies with years of strife dividing them have long since agreed to coexist as harmoniously as possible. Takigakure, the city that’s been this region’s civilian capital for nearly a century, supports the local combatants with goods, services, and job requests in return for protection and a guarantee that the vicious rivalries between Clans will be put to rest for the good of the collective community.

Hashirama has never seen anything more beautiful in his entire _life_. North of Fire Country though it is, Taki is almost entirely hidden beneath jungles and tropical rainforests so dense and ancient that his Mokuton _sang_ in it, reveling in the existence of such venerable old trees and keeping Hashirama awake at night. The plant life aside, Takigakure is built in the shade of the Tenkai no Bakufu, the Cascade of the Heavens. The biggest waterfall system in the world cloaks the village behind the thunder of white rapids and a semi-permanent spray of clean, cold mist, hiding it from the view of anything that manages to breach the protective barrier of sequoias so old they’re almost fossilized. The settlement itself is situated over the waterfalls’ plunge basin, part of it tucked into a cove behind the falls themselves, and is powered entirely by electricity drawn from the energy of millions of gallons of running water and the potency of the natural chakra found so deep in the wilds. With the cascading plumes of foamy water warping the sunlight and casting rainbows over the town near constantly, it looks like a genuine paradise, like some fragment of the Pure Lands secreted into this one corner of the world.

Hashirama had actually _cried_ when he’d seen it, but the elderly shinobi escorting him through the village’s defenses had been kind enough to dismiss it as the humidity. His presence had been requested to examine the centuries-old oak perched high up on the cliffside. Constant exposure to the weathering force of the Tenkai no Bakufu had weakened the hold of its roots on the rock face, and with Hashirama’s signature Wood Style and his skill with Earth Release, he’d been the best person to hire to ensure it wouldn’t uproot itself and crash down onto the buildings below. Planting it more securely and slightly rerouting the cascade of water had been the work of barely an hour, and he’d been invited to stay and explore the village for a few days more as thanks. 

He’s still stuffed from all of the many strange foods he’d insisted on trying from nearly every vendor he could find, and his chakra reserves are sparking dangerously from the proximity of the kind of dense greenery he makes sure to stay safely away from back home, but Hashirama honestly can’t recall another time in his adult life when he’s felt as peaceful as he does now.

Madara will probably scowl a little less when he arrives back in Fire Country bursting with the ideas he’d gotten from his trip abroad; he might even press his lips together and nod slightly, and Hashirama’s just so _happy_ from his brief excursion to _paradise_ that he honest-to-Sage _giggles_ a little. He feels a little guilty afterwards for thinking that it’s good Tobirama isn’t there to tease him for it, but not even the ever-present iron weight of grief and loneliness in his chest can ruin his good mood.

He manages to make it almost all the way back to the southern border before _that_ happens. 

Hashirama is the God of Shinobi, but he is no sensor like his little brother or best friend or wife, and although the short hairs on the back of his neck prickle with suspicion, it still takes nearly a day of travel – spent leapfrogging through the trees and chirping greetings at the exotic birds when he doesn’t scare them off with his humming – before he’s certain there’s someone tailing him.

Even once he is, he notices nothing when he examines his tracks, receives not a single indication that there is any enemy out in the wilds with him that wasn’t conjured by his own paranoia, and he forces his hands away from his scroll and picks up the pace.

He’s only a kilometer or so from the border with Hi no Kuni, soaring lightheartedly through the trees in a way he hasn’t since he was a child, when the stranger strikes in the gray light of early dawn. The enemy shinobi is very gifted, Hashirama will admit that, but going up against _him_ , when he’s full of chakra and surrounded by his element? There’s no real chance he’ll lose this battle.

He doesn’t, but it’s a true testament to his mysterious foe that it’s such a dangerously close call.

The trees thrash and batter at the spaces where the enemy nin had been not even moments before, but Hashirama hasn’t managed to land a single good blow in nearly five minutes, and the forest is so densely overgrown here that the supernova of plant life in his awareness is making it _more_ difficult to discern the whereabouts of whoever he’s fighting. A water dragon – Tobirama’s oldest and most beloved jutsu – comes barreling out to decimate his Mokuton: Wood Dragon, and it would have almost gotten Hashirama too if he hadn’t been countering this specific Suiton since his little brother invented it so long ago.

The jungle is battered under the assault of Doton after Suiton after Katon after Mokuton, dozens of high-level jutsus that rip through the undergrowth and topple trees older than the Senju Clan. The earth has been charred black and is starting to smoke, and the battle is only ended over an hour later when Uni’s Fuuton: Hurricane Spines reduces everything in a fifty-meter radius to splinters and sends diamond-hard quills raining down around the perimeter.

Hashirama himself is panting after one of the most high-paced, genuinely challenging fights he’s had in _years_ , and despite the gravity of the situation, he almost whines audibly when a long, lithe shadow drops to the ground about twenty feet in front of him. He’s put more effort into this one conflict than he has into all of his spars with Madara in the past six months – a truth that would make the Uchiha puff up in offense and snort smoke if he knew it – and the stranger he leveled this part of the forest to defeat is _still standing?_

The shinobi – still mostly obscured by the haze of dust and ash that lays low over what used to be a lovely grove of oaks – doesn’t move for seconds, a minute, five minutes, and when Hashirama has finally decided to ask what’s going on (always good to know! The key to peace is opening your arms and bringing your once-enemies into your heart!) when they move, collapsing to their knees and pressing their cloth face covering against their mouth.

“You,” rasps the ninja in a masculine, gravelly voice that should _not_ send blazing sparks of interest shooting up and down Hashirama’s spine, “you don’t know what this _means,_ do you…” 

He imagines that his own facial expression must resemble what he looked like during that moment at the Nakano when Mito told him she was expecting – Uni rattles her quills at him from a few yards away and snorts derisively at his lack of response – but he can’t bring himself to care, not when he’s too busy wondering what exactly the _fuck_ has just happened. The smog has cleared enough for him to see the sigil displayed on the other man’s forehead; he doesn’t immediately recognize it, but a few moments of squinting leads him to realize it’s the mon of one of the Waterfall Country Clans he’d met briefly while in Takigakure, but…

They were peaceful, then, if not exactly friendly – either this man is a rogue shinobi willing to splinter from his Clan and incur the wrath of his village for attacking a non-hostile entity, or there was some undercurrent during the meetings that Hashirama overlooked entirely. 

Sweat cools on the back of his neck and his long brown hair is sticking to his collarbones. It’s barely a week into February and the air is still frosty, but there’s a strange warmth in his belly and something whispering in the back of his head that burns Hashirama up from the inside out. He doesn’t think he’s been this hot since that horrible heat wave two summers ago, and when he tries to approach the ninja who’d attacked him, slowly, the same way he would a street cat, it all falls into place.

His chakra coils have been unreasonably excited for the past few days, and when he gets within sparring distance of the shinobi, there’s an implosion of energy deep within them that leaves him staggering. 

Standing a few feet away from him, almost close enough to touch, is his _soulmate_ , a well-built young man with silken brown-black hair, smooth dark skin, and a deep gray mask covering his lower face. The cool embrace of his chakra is a miasma of gold-rainstorm-early morning that makes Hashirama feel almost _high_ just breathing it in. His eyes are strange and _beautiful_ , with irises the same vibrant green as summer canopies and red sclera shot through with blood vessels.

He’s not sure when or how it happened, but he’s almost close enough to _kiss_ his unknown soulmate when the man jerks like a startled deer, only narrowly avoiding slamming his head into Hashirama’s, and flickers back into the heart of the Taki wilderness, leaving behind only a discarded sweatband bearing his Clan’s crest and the lingering impression of _home_.

“Well,” says Uni, trotting over to where Hashirama is kneeling in the dirt and clutching at nothing, “that was certainly _something_.”

Hashirama doesn’t answer. He feels like he should be crying, there’s a well of sadness and confusion in his ribcage that makes his eyes want to water, but it’s only the sting of smoky air that brings tears to the surface. He has _no idea_ what just happened, and the rest of him isn’t any more sure – his chakra is still reeling from its first true contact with his other half’s, and it hasn’t truly registered yet that he _found_ him, he _found his soulmate_.

He found the person he’s been looking for since he was ten and then he lost them just as quickly. His knees are beginning to cramp – the burn of exhaustion is tightening his muscles and shooting through his tendons, but he can’t bring himself to care.

Madara will laugh himself  _sick_ when he hears about this, and Hashirama will never be able to harp on his friend about his missing soulmate lest he choke on the hypocrisy

He spends the next hour or so like that, crouched in the charred remains of the battle with Uni snuffling around him and checking periodically to make sure he’s not actually going into shock. 

When one of Mito’s bat summons – auburn-mahogany with large dark eyes and long slender wings, he thinks it’s called Hideki – lands on his shoulder, Hashirama leaps nearly fifteen feet up into the air and screeches loudly enough to make the small creature bite at him. 

“Senju-sama,” sighs Hideki, well-used to his quirks but never thrilled to deal with them, “it is imperative that you return at once, hnn. You may be afforded appropriate time to sulk when the emergency is dealt with. Mito-hime is bleeding very badly and it is quite likely she will require your skill with healing to live.”

The confused, distraught fog is immediately cleared from Hashirama’s head, and he leaps up onto his feet and dismisses Uni before he gets moving again and asks the little bat to clarify what, exactly, is wrong with _his wife_. 

“That is not known to me,” it tells him, clinging to his shoulders with its small hooked claws. “I was sent to find you as soon as it occurred, and Mito-hime chose not to elaborate in favor of haste. I believe there may be some trouble with her soulbond, as she was expressing considerable discomfort at the sensations that were coming through it, and the chakra signature of Kyashi-chan was weak and erratic.”

“Mito’s soulmate is _alive?_ ” Hashirama asks, having spent the past few months with her under the impression that her kunoichi was lost for good. He’s glad to hear that that may not be the case, but… “Is she very upset? Is there something wrong with her?”

Hideki is quiet for a few more miles, letting the rush of wind blow over it and burying itself into the shelter of Hashirama’s broad shoulders in lieu of responding. When it finally does speak up, he has to listen for the soft chirping of its voice, and its words freeze his blood in his veins and drive him to run faster than he ever has before, so that he might reach the Senju compound before Mito is lost altogether.

 

“…It is possible that the emotional distress of the past months has been building, and that the grief Mito-hime has carried for that time is conflicting with the shock and worry she is experiencing at the implication that Kyashi-san may yet draw breath. It is further possible that her reaction is severe enough to disturb the rhythm of her body and chakra, and that it is causing an issue with the child. We’d best hurry, Hashirama-sama. There may not be much time left.”

The remainder of the journey home passes in a blur. Hashirama isn’t sure how long it is before he explodes into his home with Hideki clinging to his back, but Tōka – strong, steady Tōka, always collected and always together – physically shoves him down before he can go find Mito and ensure she’s all right.

“Aah- _Tōka_ , I _know_ you’re still mad at me, but… Let me _go_ , damn it, this isn’t about Tobirama! Mito could be _dying!_ ”

For the first time since his wedding night, his cousin meets his eyes, and he nearly crumples at the depth of the sorrow he finds there. Tōka has refused to bear his company since Tobirama’s disappearance, and for her to stop that now, for her to _touch_ her hated Clan Head and make full eye contact, terrifies Hashirama more than he could possibly say. How lost is Mito, how close to the grave is she, for his stubborn elder cousin to let go of her spite and talk sweetly down at him like a child? Has he failed not only as a brother but as a husband too, as a father-to-be? He’s about to start bawling for the second time today when she shakes her head and presses one strong-fingered hand over his mouth. 

“She is recovering, little cousin,” Tōka says, her voice low and rough and achingly familiar in the midst of Hashirama’s distress. “Baa-chan is with her. She will be _all right_ , stop looking at me like that. Mito will live, don’t cry, don’t start wailing, she’s going to _live._ ” 

He _does_ cry at that, but it’s quiet and broken and so desperately grateful. It must have been very, very serious, for Tōka to put aside her grievances and cradle him comfortingly in her warm, tight grasp, but Hashirama doesn’t have the emotional wherewithal to do anything more than sob into her shoulders and blubber incoherently about the feelings bursting in his heart. 

The sun is setting by the time their grandmother emerges from the master bedroom, her long white hair tied severely back into a tight bun and her healer’s robes covered in blood. Hashirama has already cried out all of his tears today, so he just looks up at her with raw, stinging eyes, and when she gestures for him to come in and see his wife, he pads into their shared room as quietly as he can and nearly screeches in joy when he sees Mito curled up in red-stained sheets, her scarlet hair stuck to her face and neck but her shoulders rising and falling slowly as she _breathes_.

She’s _alive,_ she _made it_ , his beloved will be just fine, and Hashirama is so deliriously relieved to know it that his new-found soulmate escapes his mind altogether.

He’s got her wrapped safely and securely in his arms when Baa-chan informs him that Mito miscarried. She nearly died along with their unborn child, but she _didn’t_ , and though their baby is lost, and blood and tissue stain the futon, Hashirama can’t bring himself to cry about that.

Mito almost _died_ , and though he is devastated at the news that his child _did_ , he cannot find the words to express just how _glad_ he is that he still has one of them. It may be callous to think, but they can have another baby - he will _never_ find another Mito. 

She’s not his soulmate – he _has_ one, now, that intriguing Waterfall shinobi – but he loves her, so fiercely and overwhelmingly that it shocks him sometimes. They’ve only been married since the fall, but he’s not sure what would happen to him if he lost her, too, along with Tobirama. 

Mito wakes for a short time that night, and she plasters herself to him and doesn’t cry. Her voice is exhausted, and it breaks in a way it never has when she tells him about Kyashi, about her wife who _isn’t dead_ , and when she apologizes for killing their child, he crushes her against his chest and murmurs soothing nonsense into her ears.

“Hmnngm, no, nononono, Miiiiii-to, it’s okay, it’s alright, _you’re_ here and that’s enough…that’s _more_ than enough…” 

That day is one of the worst of Hashirama’s life, but it’s also the first time he truly feels like he has a connection to Uzumaki Mito, and when they fall asleep tangled in each other’s arms and still unwashed, it feels like victory. It feels like there really is a peace out there, one where Mito can have her love and Hashirama can have her _and_ his unknown ninja soulmate, where Tobirama can come home and Madara can be his friend again.

Hashirama is a dreamer, a ditzy forgetful moron perpetually unaware of reality, but he has a family to fight for, now, and a determination to see his wishes become reality that makes him feel invincible.

 

UCHIHA CLAN COMPOUND, HI NO KUNI, POST-WARRING CLANS ERA

THAT SAME DAY

 

Madara has never been so close to achieving his goals. He has never been so near to the peace he’s dreamed of since childhood, has never been more hopeful for the village he wants to build with Hashirama for their people. 

He cannot ever remember being so frustrated in his _life_. 

This winter has been one of the best the Uchiha have seen in years. His entire Clan is fed and clothed and sheltered from the cold, they almost have an _excess_ of supplies and medicine, and Juuno-nee has finally stood her ground and point-blank refused to allow any children under eight to train under her. It’s a huge victory, and one that has the elders cursing her name – they’ve never liked Juuno, had forced their father to exclude her from the line of succession, have sneered at her astounding success as a kunoichi and captain, but there is no denying the power she has or the influence she holds. 

Madara is _so proud_ of her, but he really, _really_ wishes she would stop rubbing her successes in his face in some misguided attempt to make him change his mind about every issue they disagree on. 

Juuno has seated herself with the bearings of an empress in his office, having had no trouble whatsoever stealing his own chair from him and booting him down to the tatami mats like he’s six again. She’s rifling through his desk and critically examining the hundreds of scrolls and documents and stationary miscellany relating to the yet-to-be-proposed peace treaty and has spent the past hour ruthlessly eviscerating both Madara and most of the other senior Uchiha for no end of reasons. 

He’s pretty sure his headache is getting a headache, and the worrying numbness of his Mark has done nothing to improve his mood. 

“Did you have _Kagami_ write this,” Juuno asks him dryly, always ready to hit Madara in his softest, weakest spots. She _knows_ how much he adores her son, how he thinks the world of his young nephew, and has been endlessly abusing him about it since _before_ the child was born. Kagami is perhaps the brightest toddler Madara has ever met and he loves the boy like he would his own child, but he can still spare the indignation to be insulted at Juuno’s implication that he’s got as much reading comprehension and diplomatic ability as her four-year-old. 

“Kagami is a small angel come to bless our Clan with peace and joy and you should be ashamed of yourself for trying to use him against me. What kind of mother _are_ you, nee-san, always so cruel to your family— _ahgck_ , oni woman, don’t _throw_ that at me, it took me _hours_ to draft—”

“So you _were_ the one to write it,” Juuno sighs. “I am…what’s the phrase…not surprised at _all_ , this is the kind of disastrous, one-sided _nightmare_ of a proposal that will cut the last strings of Senju Hashirama’s legendary patience and get you turned into a sad, ugly tree. If you offer this to him, Madara, you’ll spend the rest of your miserable life as – as a poplar, all weedy and diseased and gross.” 

“ _Stop_ insulting me with trees, witch, you kill every plant you look at—”

“We’re at war with a man who’s practically _made of plants_ , otouto, that’s a _good thing_.” 

“—you plague this generous household, which has supported you endlessly despite your horrific personality bringing shame and dishonor to our venerable ancestors, and you poison my beloved nephew with _lies_ and _slander_ whenever you have his ear to yourself.”

Juuno laughs at him brightly, ever ready to take happiness in the suffering of innocents, and then speaks over him and where he’s slithered bonelessly onto the floor. 

“Am I poisoning you, baby? Is your evil Uncle Madara right about what a bad person I am for telling you the cold, hard truth about his atrocious lack of skills in nearly everything?”

“Yes!” chirps Kagami from where he’s appeared in the doorway, accompanied by one of Madara’s swan summons. “Yes, yes, yes, Mada-occhan, I’m _poisoned_! Mommy, there’s a letter for you. It says it’s for occhan but Kaa-chan told me to bring it to you.”

Madara hauls himself off the tatami as quickly as he possibly can and fails miserably at snatching the note from Juuno’s terrible, greedy little rat-hands. He tries to moan in despair, but Genshi, being the backstabbing miser that he is, just honks cheerfully at him and then dismisses himself, leaving him the only unoccupied being in the room and therefore the only possible victim of Kagami’s affections. 

He’s given up trying to wrench his office back from his sister once his nephew lands square in his lap, grinning like a little cherub with his squishy, soft cheeks pink from the cold and his dark eyes bright with mischief. 

“I will pray for you,” Madara tells the little boy gravely, “I will pray for your innocent soul and offer sacrifice after sacrifice to the family shrine, so that you may be free from her curse, Kagami-kun.” 

He giggles and tangles one of his small, sticky hands in Madara’s long hair, which absorbs his attention effectively enough to prevent him from looking back up and Juuno and where she’s commandeered his workspace and his correspondence with a thoughtful look on her face.

The war isn’t quite over yet and there’s no true peace, but it’s easy to forget that sometimes, when Madara can roughhouse with his nephew, knowing Kagami is protected from combat and secure in the certainty that the Clan wouldn’t let the child into battle, not with his mothers watching over him like red-eyed hawks.

Madara is tickling Kagami’s velvety stomach and making stupid faces to the child's endless delight when Juuno pipes up with a “Hey, otouto, you’re gonna want to see this.”

Kagami’s cry of “Nooooo _ooo_ , Mommy, we’re _playing_!” is ignored when she shoves the scroll – marked with the Shogun’s seal and trimmed in gold leaf – into his face. Madara’s too busy reading and rereading and trying to keep his head from exploding to hiss his sister away from her son, and the boy is efficiently herded out of the office and into Juuno’s girlfriend’s care while he’s trying to digest what the missive says.

The teasing atmosphere is quickly extinguished by the kanji glaring up at him from the paper.

Minamoto Daimaru is far from one of Madara’s favorite people, but he has to grudgingly admit that the man procures results. It’s been years of him claiming he’ll achieve the impossible, years of restless nights wondering if it’s true that everyone will have to worry about the might of a bijuu being turned against them in combat, and…

It’s happened. 

The Shogun has found a seal of the right strength, only god knows _where_ , and has successfully used it to contain the Two-Tails within one of his prisoners.

 _Uchiha-sama,_ reads the message, _We would gladly offer you access to Our very first jinchuuriki, so that you may force the Senju into peace once and for all. We are ever grateful for the services your Clan provides us with, ever aware of the many things they have done for Us, and it is finally time to repay the favor._

_The boy can be sent to your compound before the month is out. He will be accompanied by his partner, who has a working knowledge of fūinjutsu, and a small party of Our own chosen guards, to ensure no harm comes to those who do not deserve it._

The Nibi.

Minamoto wants to _give_ Madara the _Nibi,_ and apparently the poor soul it’s trapped in as well.

“You’ve read it,” intones Juuno, having returned to the office at some point while he was trying to absorb the information. Her voice is sharp and disapproving, and Madara can’t keep himself from being grateful for her endless practicality.

“I-” His throat is dry and no real noise will come out. “I- what the _fuck_. _What the_ _fuck_ am I supposed to say to this?”

She snorts and resumes her place in his chair like the thief she is. “Well, you can’t _accept_ it, obviously. I don’t imagine the stuffy old Senju bats will take kindly to you extorting them into peace, and they’ll never trust us if you constantly leverage the Two-Tails as a threat should they break what agreements you can get them to agree to.” 

“What do I do, then? I can’t just say _no,_ Juuno, you don’t just say _no thanks_ when the fucking Shogun offers you the _Nibi_ on a silver platter.”

She meets Madara’s upset stare for a few moments before sighing like _she’s_ the one who has to bear the burden of being Clan Head and shoving all of the papers off his desk, ignoring his protests and wailing. Juuno takes out a blank scroll and Madara’s best ink and neatens up the workspace, paying no mind to how she’s _trashed_ the rest of his room, before getting up, walking over to him, and pushing him bodily into the chair.

“You are the Uchiha Head,” she tells him sternly, like he doesn’t already know that. “You are the equal of the God of Shinobi. You are a passably competent ninja, and most importantly, you are a _grown-ass man_. If you can’t make the right decision just because it’s a tough one, I’ll motion to have you impeached, and don’t look at me like that, bitch, I am _not kidding._ ”

Madara is failed once again by words, and he looks down at the blank paper. It seems almost accusatory, staring up at him with its glaring lack of elegant, well-constructed solutions to yet another problem, but there’s nothing he can do about that beyond be the person to make those solutions. He’s almost mustered the nerve to pick up his brush and dip it in ink, _no thanks to Juuno_ and her background speech devaluing almost everything about him, when he senses Izuna burst into the compound with a unusually ecstatic energy about him. His elder sister doesn’t have the chakra-sense, but she does have an idiot-little-brother sense, and she straightens up with a frown when Izuna comes clattering into the house without even _taking off his shoes_ like a little rat heathen.

Madara and Juuno are just about to yell at him a rare moment of synchronization when he bounces into the office looking not unlike Kagami had, wrapped up in a haori that can’t be his – not with the stylized Senju vajra embroidered on the breast.

“Why so gloomy, my dearest family!” he greets them warmly, evidently unaware of the fact that he’s wearing clothing that prominently displays the crest of their sworn enemy. He’s got no blood on him, doesn’t seem to be coming back from a skirmish, and is largely unarmed. The heavy haori isn’t torn or dirtied in any way, indicating that Izuna obtained the thing somehow with no struggle, or that some Senju had apparently lost their mind and willingly given it to him.

Someone like, perhaps, Senju Tōka, the soulmate who Izuna has sworn multiple times to ignore completely and promised Madara and Juuno under the threat of death that he would not pursue.

Madara can’t keep his Sharingan from activating, praying to every kami there is that it’s a genjutsu and Izuna is just playing a very unfunny prank on him.

It’s not – there is no illusion causing his eyes to see what they do - and the awkward silence hanging over the office is disturbed when Juuno, that _traitor_ , bursts out laughing in their little brother’s confused face.

“I’m accepting the Shogun’s offer,” Madara announces to the room at large, trying to maintain some shred of his dignity as his older sister laughs so hard she chokes and his little brother begins squawking and flapping around, attempting to defend himself in a fit of futility.

“Ahahaha- you hear that, Izuna? Mada-chan’s decided to kill everyone, now, thanks to _you_ , brat, couldn’t you have taken off the damn haori before coming inside—”

“-Aniki’s going to _what?_ What is _happening?_ ”

“All of the Senju must be exterminated,” Madara says gravely, doing his best to ignore the way Izuna’s face falls at that, “especially all of Hashirama’s horrible witch cousins who steal away precious baby brothers and _taint_ them with—have you been _drinking_ , you idiot, it’s barely eleven in the morning!”

Izuna pouts at him with dark, wet eyes, wrapping himself up tighter in his girlfriend’s jacket.

“It was _cold_ ,” he begins, and Juuno finally slides to the floor, wheezing soundlessly and gasping for breath, “and Tōka is a lovely lady, so she was generous enough to lend me her coat- stop _laughing_ , nee-san, you’re not funny. We were on an ultra-romantic very fun stroll in the woods-”

“You were sneaking out to – to _fornicate_ with the _enemy_ ,” Madara snarls, ignoring the identical looks of exasperation he receives from his siblings at that statement, since this is not about _him_ and Hashirama is _completely_ different in any case.

“-and when we were on our ultra-romantic very fun stroll in the woods that was pure and chaste with only some hand-holding so _shut up_ _Aniki_ , a little flying summons found Tōka and called her home. There’s some kind of emergency happening in the Senju compound and Hashirama is still out, so she had to go, and she let me keep her haori because she’s an amazing woman.”

“Because she forgot it,” Juuno summarizes, “and then you ran straight home to squeal like a little pig because you’ve gotten away with stealing her outerwear.” 

Izuna pouts at her for saying that, probably because she’s right, and finally takes off his sandals just before Juuno nails him in the head with a paperweight for tracking dirt indoors and mooning around like an idiot.

“But what’s all this about killing all the Senju but definitely not Tōka specifically that you were talking about? I thought we were going to have actual peace, this is kind of a step backwards from that.”

Madara’s about to explain it to him, but Juuno beats him to the punch and fills their otouto in before she leaves with a barked order at her Clan Head to not fuck everything up. Izuna is actually decent at politics, not that anything about him would ever give that away, but he too is thoroughly vexed by the too-generous offer the Shogun has sent them for no apparent reason whatsoever.

It’s a trap if Madara’s ever seen one – he doesn’t want to know what kind of chaos Minamoto could rain down upon Hi no Kuni with the Nibi under his thumb, and together he and Izuna manage to write a reasonably polite decline, thanking him for the honor but saying that they’ve already got negotiations well in hand.

They don’t, but the Shogun doesn’t need to know it, and there is nothing good that could possibly come from the presence of a jinchuuriki in the delicate atmosphere of Konoha as it is now. Madara’s soulmark, which has been distressingly unresponsive lately, springs to life when he thinks that, and there’s no way for him to read what emotions are coming through the Bond. It’s _different_ somehow, changed subtly from what little he remembers of his soulmate; there’s an undercurrent of fire that wasn’t there before, a fleeting spark of some power so ancient and terrible that Madara has no idea what to make of it, the low humming of an ambiguously feminine voice, purring like an avalanche in the back of his head and confusing him further.

He can only _imagine_ what it must be like to be that tragic soldier Minamoto sealed the Two-Tails into, how it must _feel_ to have a monster sleeping inside your heart, and though the water-dragon numbs his arm, he doesn’t make the connection between the indescribable change in his other half and the newly captive Matatabi, hibernating beneath the red tattoos of Senju Tobirama half a world away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kakuzu/hashirama is a good ship actually and wow im deep in this hole now arent i. once they get together there is no end to the heart-stealing jokes because thats just the kind of person hashi is. SPOILERS FOR THAT MOMENT:  
> kakuzu: standing over the corpse of someone he just fucking murdered, ripping his own body into shreds so he can assimilate their still-beating heart into his fuckin horrifying curse jutsu  
> hashirama: oh baby don't go around stealing hearts,,,,,, you've already got mine uwu ;)  
> kakuzu: what the fuck is wrong with you.
> 
> im really very seriously considering making their big romantic moment like. hashirama spends a bunch of time searching fruitlessly for his soulmate while madara gloats at him and when he finally finds kakuzu who is now a literal zombie he's forced to. pay his own real soulmate actual money to get him to stay. ninja john mulaney voice: kakuzu is a ¥120,000,000 hooker, and hashirama is the absolute idiot who fell in love w him. HE'S NOT GONNA DO ANYTHING MORE FOR YOU BUDDY!! MOVE ON!!


	13. you poisoned me (just for...)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tobirama breaks out of jail and goes on a manic bender across the continent. Kakuzu has a tragic backstory and saves his own life at a considerable cost. Madara tries to organize peace with mixed results, and the world ends.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is short but it features a tobirama who is well and truly Lost In The Sauce.......hes gone wild folks! hes unlocked sicko mode and Hoo Boy
> 
> senju tobirama outed as little feral bastard boy, nasty little impulse man. dont be like him
> 
> weve officially passed 150 pages in my word document!! woohoo
> 
> when i first typed in 'kakuzu' the little red line popped up and the suggestion for auto-correct was 'kakazu' and i was terrified that id accidentally been calling him kakazu the entire damn time but then i remembered i havent used his actual name up until this point. A Great Relief
> 
> i went hog fucken wild on lore.....fun fact the golden orb-web spider has gold in the name like haha. cause kakuzu likes money.......also i thought it was neat. did NOT plan to give him spider summons but Again Here We Are...
> 
> EDIT: more notes on the egf and the spiders
> 
> the reason no one has ever managed to successfully steal the jutsu before is because only clan members know there's actually two components to it, and kakuzu is the first person ever to have both a) access to the scroll he needs - it's necessary bc the process is long and dangerous and requires a lot of careful intervention on behalf of the spiders while he slow-cooks, and they can't just memorize all of it when they've never actually had the scroll before and b) an excellent relationship With the spiders that allows him to both earn the threads that are needed for the egf and like. just be cool bros w em.
> 
> there are very few people who are compatible with the spiders And strong members of the arashisen clan, so jorogumo has a very close relationship with the earth grudge fear specifically and also most of the people who have ever had it. her cooperation is necessary for it cause shes the one who makes the silk etc etc
> 
> rn kakuzu is just gonna like. simmer on low heat for several hours and he won't like melt and reform like butterflies but his body is undergoing Massive changes very rapidly, so he can't be conscious for it. the spiders keep him alive with chakra and make sure the process goes properly, and without their intervention he would die
> 
> fuu is also a taki legend but she's Wayyyyyy not born yet and will unfortunately Not appear in this fic :-( i love her tho. trans lesbian icon, queen of my heart
> 
> maybe taki is just bug-friendly. aburame clan move to fucken waterfall country challenge

IN THE SUBTERRANEAN DUNGEON, MIZU NO KUNI, POST-WARRING CLANS ERA

AROUND THAT TIME

 

The Seal of Tartarus is finally healed. All of the alterations and extensions have settled, none of the sealwork has been rejected by either Tobirama or Matatabi, and the two of them have developed a working rapport that should, with enough luck, finally give them their freedom. 

He and Kyashi and have been working on this plan for _weeks_ now, polishing it up as he recovers and hiding the evidence of their plotting from the increasingly-nosy Zetsu. He’s already well aware of just how unlikely it is that they’ll pull it off and bust themselves out of prison – has been listening to Kyashi talk at him about _the timelines_ and _delayed action_ and _planting seeds_ and other such nonsense for a while, and they’re finally ready.

Matatabi does not know. It is a crucial component of their plan that she does not know, and Tobirama is very fortunate that his hair is already white, because the stress of hiding it from her when she literally lives _inside his soul_ would have long since leeched it of color already.

She has refused to allow him access to her power, spends her every waking moment ensuring that their separate reserves _remain_ separate, will not entertain any conversation relating to Tobirama’s status as a jinchuuriki. She is, rather understandably, wary of humans, and although she has shared her name, she’s not yielded on anything else.

They finally do it a few weeks before his eighteenth birthday. The Zetsu watching them right now is Shiro, the white clone with the stolen Sharingan – once Tobirama uses Matatabi’s power to rip through the barriers sealing away most of their chakra, it’ll be quick work to destroy it, and then, if they move fast enough, they should be able to escape.

The Dokuzetsu has spread its roots deep within the heart of its Shogunate, and it’s a calculated risk, but the odds that it will abandon years’ work of careful, delicate manipulation for one jinchuuriki and one kunoichi are low. Tobirama _has_ to do this now – if he waits any longer Matatabi may discover that he’s planning to betray her fragile trust, and rumor (read: what the clones deliberately let them overhear to psych them out) has it that Dokuzetsu has bartered some kind of _deal_ involving the Nibi – some lord halfway across the continent has won himself its favor and is being rewarded with brief possession of a weaponized, controllable bijuu.

The longer the two of them wait, the more danger they put themselves in; up until this point the stalling could be reasonably dismissed as caution and planning, but Kyashi has assured him _many_ times that they’re about to reach the point of no return. Any later, and they’ll be trapped here with no conceivable escape opportunities for the near future, and Tobirama will have to live with the Two-Tails’ livid rage. Well. He’ll _still_ have to do that if they succeed, but at least he’ll be _free._  

Tonight, Tobirama will consciously channel Matatabi’s energy for the first time. He’s going to have to learn how to control it on the spot and he has to be able to hold on to the connection against the will of a Tailed Beast. Kyashi has to play bodyguard to ensure Tobirama can stabilize himself; she’s also been responsible for destroying all notes and evidence of the Seal of Tartarus beyond the seal itself and has done her best to pull what strings she can to optimize this opportunity.

They have an itinerary and have rehearsed it several times as discreetly as possible – conveniently, that also gave the Zetsu guards the impression that they’re both going crazy, which may or may not be happening anyway. Right now, it’s 7:45 p.m. Konoha time. The clones change shifts every four hours, so in fifteen minutes, Shiro ought to arrive with three other white Zetsu, and while they’re still dismissing their comrades on duty, there will be a three-second window when no one but Kyashi will be looking directly at Tobirama.

Time has never passed so slowly as it does now. Watched pots never boil, or something like that, but Tobirama doesn’t have anything to do _but_ watch, and Kyashi is still pretending to sleep like the nocturnal goblin she is. It’s entirely possible she’s _actually_ unconscious – if that’s the case, he’s not sure he’ll wake her up. She’s not _technically_ necessary for this plan, all of her efforts being concentrated in preparation and coordination, and if she misses out on the moment the two of them have been waiting for as literal weeks have passed, she deserves to get left behind.

There’s a small cache of stasis seals hidden beneath the pile of papers they’d scrawled with incomprehensible gibberish and deliberately shitty poetry about their respective soulmates. Matatabi has taken great offense to the lack of odes to her glory and greatness and has been sleeping the past week or so away. Tobirama has taken advantage of this to subtly open the floodgates built into the Tartarus Seal – the increased access will allow him to funnel more of her chakra into his own coils, and in theory, he shouldn’t need any more than he can extract during the three seconds he’s waiting anxiously for.

Tobirama crouches casually in the shadows next to the futon for what feels like eternity. He’s let an infinite number of seconds go by, but it’s _not time yet_ , and he feels completely justified in jabbing his nearest hand into Kyashi’s nest, greatly appeased by the offended yelp he gets and easily able to avoid the foot that comes flying at his face, fully conscious as he is. 

That rat bitch _was_ asleep – her short hair is tousled and greasy, her four eyes blinking open slowly. Kyashi’s face is still lax from rest, and she doesn’t even bother to defend herself when Tobirama starts hissing nervously at her for having the _gall_ to take a _nap_ when it’s almost time for their mission.

“There was no gall,” she tells him primly, raking her bangs back into a properly styled bedhead and smoothing out the wrinkles in her dirty kimono shirt. “I Saw that there was enough time for me to sleep, and I Saw that you would wake me up – rudely, but you still did – and I was tired, so. It’s just being _energy efficient_ , Tobes, don’t give me that look. If you keep that expression up the entire time Madara’s never gonna shower you with affection, ‘cause there won’t be any room for his penis in your ass, not with that stick shoved in so firmly.”

Tobirama is endlessly grateful for the horrible lighting in the dungeon and immensely thankful for the many limitations of the Vision Fourfold – Kyashi can’t see through darkness nor does she have supernatural eyesight, since her kekkei genkai isn’t technically a dōjutsu. Not, of course, that it matters, since there’s no way she can’t tell he’s blushing so hard that his face feels like it might catch fire. 

He doesn’t get the chance to smack her for being crass, though, because Matatabi must be able to sense the sudden flush of embarrassment. Tobirama can feel her shift drowsily inside her seal-space, and he spends a few terrifying minutes listening to his heartbeat thunder in his chest so loudly it’s a miracle that it doesn’t wake her up. She’s just stirring, though, moving mechanically as she dreams, and by the time he can breathe again, Kyashi has gotten herself into position. All of their supplies and weapons had been taken or lost, so they only have chakra to defend themselves with. Tobirama will be well-protected with Matatabi’s claws and his newly-discovered healing abilities, but Kyashi has no such advantages – to counter this, she’s been sealing tiny increments of chakra in her tattoos. They function like batteries, storing any amount of energy covertly; even with almost all of her reserves locked away by the bars, she’s got a backup supply of chakra that nearly doubles the amount she already has.

Tobirama checks one last time to make sure Matatabi is well and truly asleep, to ensure that his sealing lines are primed to channel her chakra, and when the guards change shifts moments later, it’s time. 

He reaches deep into the Tartarus Seal, wraps himself around the incomprehensible vastness of Matatabi’s latent energy, and _pulls_ with all his might.

Even as she wakes with a roar, there’s raw chakra lighting up his tattoos and burning through the barrier, overwhelming the chakra-absorbing properties of the bars and exploding outwards with such intensity that it blasts through them. Tobirama has never felt so _alive_ , so _strong_ , and the entire world seems to be frozen in molasses as the Nibi’s vitality courses through his chakra veins. 

He wonders if this is what it feels like to have the Sharingan activated. Every one of his senses is heightened to crystal clarity, and his perception is near-omnipotent; he notes the smallest twitch in Shiro’s posture as it reacts to the surprise even as he watches Kyashi crouch like a tigress and spring forward through the opening he’s just made, her muscles coiled like steel springs and lightning crackling around her in a veil of stormy energy. The dungeon is alive with smells he’d never noticed before, with sounds he hasn’t heard – the Zetsu clones and their stench of rotting plant matter, the cell itself, nearly marinated in sweat – gross, the burning metallic scent of electricity burning through the nearest white clone.

When Tobirama is used to the overwhelming increase in sensory input, everything abruptly sharpens, and he summons Matatabi’s claws and wears them like oversized chakric gauntlets, shredding Shiro into gooey, pale gray ribbons even though he’s sure he was still in the holding cell barely a second ago.

Kyashi slams the paralysis seal onto the door as she closes it behind him, suspending the matter of that room indefinitely until it’s disturbed. They’ve timed it perfectly; the retiring shift of Zetsu is right in front of Tobirama when he blitzes out into the hallway, and he doesn’t even stop to attack them – just barrels recklessly through and lets them shrivel up under the assault of bijuu chakra. 

It’s a strange feeling, being so keenly aware of such a multitude of things, and coupled with Tobirama’s typical laser focus, it creates an interesting tunneling effect – something that would fascinate him if he wasn’t completely unsure of what happened during the break-out. Kyashi had walked him through the route they would take to escape, had warned him about everything in the castle that would be predetermined – the schedules and routes of the guards and the maintenance staff, the meeting Dokuzetsu has with an Earth Country Daimyo that will keep it occupied until they’re too late to be stopped, the precise layout of the walls and exits and railings that he’s intellectually aware of.

In reality? Everything is a blur.

Tobirama doesn’t know anything but the addicting blaze of _Matatabi-frostburn-thunderbolt_. He has no attention span for anything beyond the implosion of energy beneath his skin or the sensation of tails whipping out behind him when he’s sure he shouldn’t have them. He’s a little ashamed to say it, but he even loses Kyashi – the moment he bursts out into open ground, he just _runs_ , sprinting wildly into the west with nary a glance to spare for any of his surroundings. 

It’s not dissimilar to how he felt when he first met Madara, except this time the supernova is contained within _him._ There is not any distant point eating constantly away at his awareness. The blinding fog of overenergized ecstasy that surrounds him eclipses everything even as it strengthens him beyond anything he’s ever known before. He’s always been a gifted sensor, but now the entire _continent_ is splayed before him in his mind’s eye, a hundred thousand overlapping constellations of life burning merrily away as he races aimlessly into the horizon. 

Distantly, Tobirama thinks he might have taken too much too fast, may be burning the candle on both ends. He shouldn’t be so dangerously reckless with his power or Matatabi’s, he should be making sure that Kyashi is safe and sound on his heels, he should be losing whatever tail they may have attracted and ideally stopping to snatch whatever he can from his environment if he has the chance, but…

Tobirama isn’t here right now. There’s really nothing conscious controlling him – Matatabi is certainly not fueling the chakra cloak, not with the Seal closed so tightly he’s barely aware of her inside of it – there’s just the high of raw emotion.

Somewhere too far away, deep in the heart of Hi no Kuni, Tobirama senses Madara-mate, an _unclaimed_ Madara-mate who does not know Tobirama, does not who he owns and is owned by in turn. Long-buried animal instincts steer Tobirama unerringly towards the shining sun of his chakra signature, as they always have – Madara is the nexus of his existence, the core point around which his universe orients itself, and he couldn’t ignore that even if he tried.

For the first time in a _very_ long time, there is nothing stopping Tobirama from just flashing towards his soulmate, no second thoughts to slow him down and no better judgement to smother his enthusiasm. There is no force in the world that can break through his newly-cemented determination, nothing at all that can make him see reason.

  
Tobirama has been nothing but logic and overthinking for longer than he cares to remember, and now is maybe the only chance he’ll have to just _do_ whatever he wants, to be selfish and impulsive and bold in taking what he wishes with no regrets.

He runs and runs and runs until he can feel his feet again, if only because of the pain shooting up through his abused soles, but he keeps going, still insensate with Matatabi’s power even as he slams down tightly on her restraints. He runs beyond even that, chasing the setting moon and then the travel of the sun through its circuit in the heavens, moving and moving and refusing to stop until he’s exhausted his body of every last shred of energy and can’t do anything to keep himself from collapsing, falling to the ground like a limp ragdoll as his vision finally fades to black.

 

 

TAKIGAKURE NO SATO, WATERFALL COUNTRY, PRE-FOUNDERS’ ERA

A FEW WEEKS LATER

 

The elders have been called together, and the formal hearing of Arashisen Kakuzu has been scheduled for today, at noon.

He has failed his Rite of Passage and returned to his Clan bereft of the heart of Senju Hashirama, and for his crimes, for his inability to successfully prove his worth as the heir, he will be tried. It is almost certain that he will be sentenced to death.

Kakuzu’s adopted father has already taken a ceremonial knife and cut the corners of his mouth, drawing them clear back to his cheekbones. All of the healers in the village have been forbidden to close the wounds, so that his shame may be visible upon his face until the day he dies. The mark of a traitor, of a _failure_ , whisper the same people who took Kakuzu in as an abandoned infant, the very same shinobi who trained him and raised him and fought with him to see him become the fearsome warrior he is today.

Well. The fearsome warrior he _was._ Kakuzu will never again serve his Arashisen Clanmates, will never again bear the crest of Takigakure’s infamous cataracts on anything he wears. 

It wasn’t always like that – just since his botched assassination of the _God_ of Shinobi, just since he failed to kill the one man alive who may be entirely _immune_ to death in any form. 

Kakuzu has spent the last few weeks brooding, and it’s been very difficult to ignore the glaring reality that that very same man is, in fact, his soulmate, his one true partner. The Senju Clan Head behaves like an overpowered, overgrown _child_ ; he’d been off-shift while their Fire Country visitor was in town, but there is no man, woman, or child anywhere in Takigakure who is unfamiliar with Senju Hashirama and his impossibly boisterous laugh, no one who does not know the blinding grace of his ever-present smile, not a _single person_ who is not aware that the most powerful ninja to ever live is almost unbelievably kind, and caring, and generous, and that he has beautiful brown eyes, and—

It’s very, very fortunate that Kakuzu is just so _good_ at stewing in his own misery; it’s kept him from having to acknowledge the _embarrassment_ that burns through him whenever he thinks about the dumb, juvenile _crush_ he has on the most famous man in the world, who is possibly the most handsome as well, and _nonononono_ he _cannot_ cultivate this weakness.

Part of him wonders if it’s really so bad to dream of the impossible. He’s going to die before the sun sets, and the only way to have avoided this fate would have been to rip Senju’s heart out of his ~~broad, well-muscled~~ chest, something that he _tried already_ , something that experience has proved to be _impossible_.  
  
Beyond that, he barely had the skill as a shinobi to escape their skirmish alive, and had allowed that tiny, pink-nosed, wet-eyed little _pincushion_ to nearly shred him into nothingness. It’s only the dubious mercy of fate that protected him from the deadly ferocity of the hurricane-force winds it had somehow produced and only the dense shelter of the forest that saved him from the downpour of hundreds of its senbon-like quills.

Kakuzu is heartless and worthless and a dead man walking, so he manfully refuses to consider just how criminally adorable it is that a warrior as renowned and fearsome as Senju has _hedgehog summons_ – not even porcupines, which are at least bigger than mice and poisonous to boot, but – _hedgehogs._

For entirely unrelated reasons, Kakuzu has recently developed an overwhelmingly confusing love-hate relationship with the spiny little rats, and he will take no questions on this matter, or any others, and nothing is important anyway because he’s going to die and if he keeps on unintentionally remembering his soulmate’s biceps he’s actually going to start looking _forward_ to his execution.

Not, of course, that Kakuzu will really die. Despite his lack of blood relation to the foremost of Taki’s shinobi Clans, despite his lack of affiliation with any recognized lineage at all, he is the only individual in generations to have proved compatible with the grueling, gory power of the Earth Grudge Fear, the Arashisen’s coveted kinjutsu. It’s jealously guarded and nearly infamous for being an impossibly difficult technique to master, which is what makes him, an insignificant foundling, so surprisingly important. 

He was brought before the ancient spools of fate-thread years ago, back when he was only five. The person who escorted him there was his adopted father’s husband, the Clan Head’s second-in-command; the man had died that day, having been deemed _unworthy_ by Jorōgumo.

Kakuzu had stood and watched as his papa was devoured alive by spiders bigger than the jungle cats, horrified at the sight but still unafraid. The Spider Queen is the yōkai-goddess of the waterfalls, the immortal temptress of Taki’s sacred forests, and, most importantly, the source of the silken threads so crucial to the Earth Grudge Fear. Jorōgumo’s spider-silk is worth a hundred times its weight in gold – it’s stronger than any other fiber, a phenomenal conductor of chakra, and can be used to suture together a person split into two. Her legendary thread is fiercely protected, and only those humans strong enough to wield it properly are permitted to possess it. 

Kakuzu is one such human.

He’s been signed to Jorōgumo and her kin since that day, and has trained for two decades to prepare his body to receive the fate-threads. Assassinating the God of Shinobi was the last hurdle he had to overcome, a task assigned by the Clan elders so that he can prove himself truly worthy. 

The Spider Queen has no such stipulations, and the respect Kakuzu once held for his village and his people was the only thing keeping him from just taking the scroll, climbing up to the source of the waterfalls, and doing it himself.

It’s early dawn on the day of his trial, and Kakuzu has only a few hours left before he has to arrive at the spiders’ nest with at least four hearts in his possession. Four is the maximum he can incorporate into himself with the Earth Grudge Fear, but his summons are always so ravenously hungry, and are more than deserving of a treat for their unwavering support through anything and everything. 

He slinks back into the Arashisen compound, darting noiselessly through the trees and buildings and slipping unnoticed into his old room. He’d been forbidden from returning here, even to gather his belongings, and he still won’t take them now, but it’s nostalgic, jumping lightly through the window as he’s done so many times before and looking around at the place one last time. When Kakuzu leaves, he carefully and quietly shuts the shoji door before spitting an explosive Katon jutsu right through it and sending the room up into flames. 

Arashisen Kamoto, the man he’d called his father, is still sleeping. He won’t ever wake, not with the spider venom Kakuzu had snuck into his evening meal, but his heart is still fresh when he comes to rip it out and stuff it into the storage scroll. The three ruling elders are next – Kakuzu has never really bothered to refer to them by name and he’s not going to start now – and old and drugged as they are, it’s almost disappointingly easy to steal their hearts, too, and place them carefully into the scroll as the fire spreads throughout the compound.

People are awake, now, ringing alarms and evacuating children and trying to put it out, but Kakuzu’s Katon: Hellflame is almost entirely unquenchable, and he’s certain that no one here knows the technique required to put the white flames out.

He makes his way to the hidden shrine that protects the kinjutsu, very thankful it’s remained on Clan grounds and had not yet been moved into the village proper. The screaming and wailing of the dead and dying and the smell of carbonized flesh behind him makes his stomach turn, but he forces down the emotion – it was a weakness in his youth to bother getting attached to these people, and hanging on to it now is a weakness in the present.

Kakuzu’s papa had been the one to find him, the one to take him in and give him a surname, but the man is twenty years dead now, and whatever memories he has of the gentle, compassionate baby he rescued from the deadly bite of winter no longer apply. Kakuzu is a different person, a man fully grown, and hanging on to his hope and his trust is what brought him to be so loyal to the village, so loyal to an authority that deemed him worthless for not succeeding in doing the impossible. 

Hashirama isn’t like that, whispers the back of his mind traitorously. Hashirama loves the individual as he does the whole. You’d be welcome as a Senju… _they_ wouldn’t turn their backs on you after demanding the life of your soulmate… 

He finally reaches the shrine, taking his sweet time on the walk so he has to hear and smell and endure the way his Clan is burning to death behind him. It’s to make him strong, to make him immune to vulnerability, but when he gets there, he has to press his mask against his mouth and aggravate his unhealed cuts to keep from vomiting. It’s just the smell of burning meat, Kakuzu reminds himself. Burning meat, traitorous meat, not your _people_.

He steels himself and slips into the shrine, destroying the traps and protective jutsus meant to keep him from doing what he is. It takes a total of thirty minutes, start to finish, for Kakuzu to infiltrate his old Clan compound, burn it to the ground, and steal their coveted Earth Grudge Fear for his own. 

It takes barely half an hour for him to destroy the life he’d known. When the Hellflames have destroyed the Arashisen district, Kakuzu breaks and ends the jutsu. The fire is extinguished; the village as a whole is saved, and only one Clan is lost to the tragic accident.

Years later, it’s still said that every last secret about the Earth Grudge Fear perished in that deadly blaze. Every last one; there is only one soul alive who knows that it was arson, only one man remaining who is aware that the kinjutsu technique still exists, only one person left who can bear the weight of its legacy and use the jutsu for himself. 

By the time that man is infamous for it, renowned across the continent because of his ruthlessness and his invincibility and his impossibly _unique_ Earth Grudge Fear, there is no living person left who remembers the boy who was Kakuzu, and Takigakure quickly forgets the greatest and most vicious of its sons. He is only too glad to forget it in turn, after all, and when Kakuzu has what he came for, he turns on his heel and doesn’t look back. 

It’s an hours-long journey to the source of the waterfalls and another forty-five minutes to reach the secret entrance to the spiders’ caverns, and he has no time to waste.

This gorge is hidden deep within the Taki caves and is where Jorōgumo has woven hundreds of thousands of miles of webs. She stores her fate-threads - the ones specially produced for human use - in massive spools taller and wider than a man, which are located just inside the mouth of the cave but inaccessible until the spider matriarch grants him her blessing.

Kakuzu doesn’t have to wait long before the excited flood of spiderlings turns into a frenzy, with older, larger children coming out of their crevices to witness the first gifting of the Taki kinjutsu to a human in nearly a century.

He’ll never get tired of the sight Jorōgumo makes when she emerges from her depths to greet him.

One long, gold-banded leg, wrapped in a carapace harder than rock and lighter than leaves, shoots out of the darkness to impale its tarsus on the canyon’s mouth. Another follows it, and then another, and then a fourth, and by the time Jorōgumo’s eldest descendants have gathered to witness the ritual, she’s hauled herself up onto the ceiling, glittering in innumerable jewel-tones like a true goddess and staring down at Kakuzu with her eight enormous eyes. 

This spider has been like a mother to him, and she may be the being he’s closest to in the entire world. Jorōgumo gnashes her chelicerae thoughtfully, and when the overlapping whispers of her kin no longer echo throughout the cavern, she speaks.

[ _You have made the right choice, chosen-son,_ ] she tells him, her voice ringing clarion-clear in the back of his mind. [ _Leaving the village is the only way for you to achieve your true potential and fulfill the future that was meant for you. I have seen it in my weaving – this is no mistake, Kakuzu. Now is finally the time. You are ready to receive the silks. Bring out the scroll, now, and the hearts you’ve collected._ ]

Kakuzu lifts up the kinjutsu scroll and the sealing scroll he’d brought alongside it. Pilfering the hearts of the wretched old crooks who plotted against him and wished to see him dead was easy – sacrificing them to the Spider Queen will be even easier. He opens the scroll of Earth Grudge Fear, four hearts strung around his neck, and when Jorōgumo descends from her perch on the ceiling and dances on the golden lines of her web, the spooled threads begin to glow like the midday sun. Strands of spider-silk unspool themselves and begin to lash out, but they’re quickly restrained by the thousands of spider summons in attendance, and Kakuzu stands statue-still so they can wrap him up like a corpse. 

It’s almost frightening, being cocooned alive and then lowered gently into the waiting chelicerae of Jorōgumo, who grasps his helpless body lightly, ensuring she doesn’t spear him on her fangs. When the threads turn solid gold and _burn_ like a cattle-brand, Kakuzu forces himself to remain calm and stationary. The chief summons is only feeding him her chakra, personally spinning the silk into his being, allowing the sacrificial hearts to be subsumed by the threads as she works. After an agonizingly long time spent suspended in her grip, Jorōgumo is finished, and Kakuzu is carefully placed at the very center of one of her webs.

  
The last thing he notices before he goes under for the metamorphosis is the odd blistering of his chest, and Kakuzu falls unconscious with the infuriatingly charming smile of Senju Hashirama echoing in his memories.

 

DEMILITARIZED ZONE, HI NO KUNI, PRE-FOUNDERS’ ERA

THAT SAME WEEK

 

The peace negotiations are going very, very slowly.

The Uchiha have the power at the moment, so Madara’s Clan is demanding either total submission from the Senju – including the rights to their territory and trained soldiers – and the Senju are grievously offended by this and ready to re-declare war, something that surprises absolutely no one.

Madara is pretty sure things would be smoother if that _witch_ Uzumaki Mito wasn’t being so damn _unprofessional_ , fidgeting like a child being made to sit through council meetings. She’s not listening to anything, she’s continually bringing her hands up to pluck at the collar of her kimono, and perhaps most importantly, she is _not controlling Hashirama_.

He’s nearly been set on fire three times already just for being himself, and his other babysitter – that kunoichi with the topknot Izuna is literally _drooling_ over – is equally distracted by him, which is fundamentally horrifying to Madara on all levels and he’s a moment away from agreeing to whatever lopsided terms the Senju could possibly want as long as they agree to keep that woman locked far, far away from Izuna. 

They’re not even touching a potential village right now – for some reason many parties on both sides are convinced that the world will fall apart if the two Clans just _stop fighting_ and are repeatedly demanding solutions to problems that _aren’t real_. Madara’s screamed so much at such a volume that he’s almost lost his voice, and to make it worse, Juuno is the person who he has to hoarsely whisper his suggestions to for her to share them with the committee.

It’s an unmitigated _nightmare_ , and an entire week passes before they finish haggling over the Nakano. The river has served as a physical division between Uchiha and Senju lands since time out of mind – it’s the only border, in fact, that’s any kind of tangible, and for some reason this has compelled his own dearest aunties to demand that – _they change that somehow?_

Great-Aunt Kira has either moved for the Uchiha to claim the _entirety_ of the Nakano watershed, which cannot be contained in all of Fire Country, or proposed that the Senju with their Earth and Water Release just _move the river._  

Hashirama actually gives up and starts thumping his head against the table he’s grown, and no one tries to call him out on it, because they all understand how he feels. Except half of the people in attendance are Uchiha, which means they are almost genetically compelled to pounce on any deviant behavior they can, and the fourth day of peace talks dissolves into a fistfight that is only ended by judicious and enthusiastic application of the Mokuton to thirty-four people, all of whom are fully grown adults.

Kagami is here, too, and he’s behaving better than nearly all of his clansmen, because he’s a sweet little angel; also contributing to his unusual obedience is Juuno and her uncanny ability to force pretty much anyone to do pretty much anything she wants. Madara has no doubt she’s given up on her own son’s innocence and has bribed the boy into making seasoned shinobi seven times his age look like squalling brats.

Things are only beat back into some semblance of control on the evening of the eighth day, and before there is tranquility, there is chaos unlike almost anything Madara has ever had the misfortune of seeing.

The squadron of scouts that had been assigned to patrol the perimeter and keep watch for enemies, composed of both Senju and Uchiha and therefore entirely useless due to the nonstop infighting, comes flying back to camp in a storm of kunai and shouting, and it takes a full ten minutes for the racket to settle down and the news to actually be shared.

It would seem there is an intruder, a single shinobi unrecognizable due to their lack of sigil or Clan-specific style. The warning is nice – it’s one of the first times any mixed-Clan group has actually managed to do _anything_ productive, even if it’s just delivering a message – but too little too late, since Senju Takuma is interrupted mid-speech by delighted shrieking and a sharp spike of chakra coming from somewhere within the camp.

The foreign nin snuck in completely unimpeded, disregarding how she let herself be seen, and she has skipped all introductions to go straight into…making out with Uzumaki Mito.

There’s a flurry of movement as people try to pry the two women apart, but they are stubborn and determined and cannot be separated, something that is quickly respected the moment Mito’s new _friend_ nearly decapitates the Senju boy who’d tried to grab at her arm. 

“Uzumaki,” growls Madara over the gossiping and background din of excited chatter, “what the _hell_ is wrong with you, devil woman, aren’t you supposed to be a _ninja?"_

Predictably, Hashirama is no help at all in this matter, since he’s got his hands clutched to his chest and appears to be literally _weeping with joy_ at the sight of his _wife_ being inappropriately intimate with a strange kunoichi. Tōka slaps briskly at the back of her cousin’s head, something that is actually met with a fucking _wistful sigh_ from Izuna, but it doesn’t work – the God of Shinobi is incapacitated in another of his frequent fits of emotion, and no one can get him to stop _sobbing_ until Mito’s partner channels a pulse of chakra to her throat and bellows very, very loudly at everyone to “SHUT THE FUCK UP, MORONS, THIS IS A _MOMENT_. YOU’RE RUINING OUR _MOMENT!”_

“ _You’re_ ruining our fucking _treaty_!” Madara blusters at her, ever unable to keep his own mouth shut and immediately regretting it when the woman turns four sharp yellow eyes on him, and he _recognizes_ her. It was one brief time months ago, but this is the very same kunoichi who performed the eye transplant and so grievously disrespected the Uchiha way. She’s obviously just come from the road and looks like she hasn’t seen a shower in three weeks, but she is unquestionably free.

“Kyashi,” says Mito, graceful as usual despite the lipstick smeared all over her face and jaw, pulling the other kunoichi to her feet as she stands up, “welcome to – the negotiations, and _where the FUCK have you BEEN_ , what _happened_ to ‘I promise I’ll send letters, Meets! I promise I’ll stay safe, Meets, let me go on my mission that’s a terrible idea that I should fucking _know_ is a terrible idea since I can _SEE THE FUTURE!_ ’—” 

“What happened,” Kyashi replies, wiping makeup off her mouth, “was a whole _bunch_ of really unbelievable shit, and if you could take me somewhere private where I don’t have to look at Uchiha Madara, that would be _fantastic_ and I’ll explain everything.”

Madara squawks in offense – who is this person! Why is she like this! Will he be allowed to fight her – but is quickly distracted by Hashirama, who pops up like a daisy and crushes him in a brutally tight hug.

“Isn’t it _beautiful_ , Madara,” he wails, far too loud and far too close. People are dispersing, still talking about whatever the fuck just happened, but higher-ranked shinobi seem to be herding them away to another part of camp, something he’s infinitely grateful for even as he’s choked to death. “Ohhhhhh _hhhhh_ , Mito’s just been so _upset_ , and the only thing that would make this more perfect is Tobirama! Ooh, or that Taki ninja! I mean, they’re not here, of course, that would be such an _insane_ coincidence, but at least Mito has her soulmate back, and now I can be the second wife again! Oh, my friend, peace truly _is_ possible!”

He chokes on every other word and seems to pay no mind to either how he’s killing Madara via strangulation or to the pine tree over there, where Mito and Kyashi are having a very enthusiastic reunion. Apparently, they’ve decided to skip talking for now in favor of just having sex against a pine, which.

It says an awful lot about Madara and where he is as a person that the only thing he thinks when he’s unfortunate enough to see them is how much he wishes he had his _own_ long-lost soulmate to fuck into a tree.

The next morning things are considerably calmer now that Mito is back to her usual tyrant self and is additionally accompanied by the hell-cat kunoichi, another witch he’s decided should be burned. Whatever his opinions of her – his _very_ low opinions of her – he is grudgingly forced to admit that she’s excellent at terrorizing rowdy masses into sedation. 

The meetings are still very slow, but they are productive, and the most divisive issue – how the newly demilitarized neutral zones that both the Senju and Uchiha have legitimate claim to, and how they should set the tone for interactions going forward – is settled, to much general surprise, by _Hashirama_ , who is using this chance to propose something based on what he’d seen in Taki some time ago.

The peace treaty is finalized three months later, suspended on the very fragile compromise that exists between Clans who have been traditional enemies for _generations_ , and it’s nothing less than a miracle.

That miracle is shattered almost immediately by the Kyuubi no Kitsune and the violent rash of wildfires sparked by its sudden, inexplicable rage; only days after it destroys massive swathes of forest for no apparent reason, it flies into a fury that may very well destroy all of Fire Country.

It’s been whipped into a frenzy by the sudden presence of the Two-Tails, the bakeneko, the bijuu that _Minamoto_ controls, and the pair of them clash in a duel more ferocious and destructive than anything Madara and Hashirama could ever possibly _hope_ to match in ten lifetimes. 

Not even the Mokuton can stop them, and neither can Mito and her Adamantine Sealing Chains, or anything else the endangered shinobi of Konoha try to fling at them. Madara had only just gotten adjusted to waking up in the morning to a world without conflict, and before he knows it the bijuu are awakened, and the apocalypse alongside them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hmm. the pacing at the end is strange but thats ok cause time is wack and we have a lot, and i mean A Lot to get through before That fucken cliff-hanger is gonna get any resolution. ive decided that mito Is going to be a jinchuuriki so there's a lil teaser, a tiny hint about what tf is gonna go down in like seven chapters when we get back to this
> 
> me: dont double update dont double update dont double update  
> me to me: but what if. YOU DOUBLE UPDATED,
> 
> i mean i just cant argue with that logic :(


	14. ...another dollar (in your pocket)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay folks spacing is fucked matatabi's narration needs to be rewritten for a better tone but im fucking tired and its already been vastly improved.
> 
> tobi + matatabi aren't friends but they aren't enemies. they're hovering between blood feud and ride-or-die and this is the awkward developmental stage in between that will forge their bond in heart and blood and soul anda blah blah blah
> 
> im tired and will update this + the notes later but rn guess WHAT. i dont fuckin care!! i have to get up early tomorrow so this doesn't even get a summary!! and NO end notes. absolutely fucking lawless on main
> 
> FUCK content warning: self-harm, some implied suicidal ideation, implied depression/ptsd, mentioned panic attacks
> 
> everything's okay though, this is the recovery stage and healing isnt linear. tobirama is never going to be Healthy but he's going to get better and to do that you have to get worse too....he's Healing and its tough
> 
> EDIT: fixed some continuity errors...its very easy to tell that i have no plan and forget things when i rewrite them and it shows! not feelin up to doing notes/summary now so that'll come Later

ON THE NORTHWESTERN ISLANDS, MIZU NO KUNI, PRE-FOUNDERS’ ERA

THREE DAYS AFTER THE JAILBREAK

 

Tobirama _knows_ he’s not any more immune to sudden rash decisions than anyone else. He _knows_ that gambling runs in his family, thanks to the war and the fighting and the subsequent need for the high of an adrenaline rush to break through the numbness. He _knows_ he’s _more_ prone to being stupid, not despite his genius, but because of it.

This isn’t like the time he dyed his hair pink just to see what his father would do. This isn’t like the time he made the Edo Tensei, senseless from sleep deprivation and so crushingly _alone_ in the absence of his brothers. This isn’t like anything he’s ever done before, and there is no framework to give it context, nothing to give him a different perspective.

The last thing he remembers is the moment before he channeled Matatabi’s chakra into himself – and then he woke up on the westernmost island of Water Country, collapsed on a beach with crystal-blue seawater lapping at his ruined, stinging feet.

Tobirama hasn’t eaten or slept or drank since then. Matatabi is waging war, and he’s just doing everything he can to keep her within the Tartarus Seal and firmly, resolutely _imprisoned._

It’s not really working all that well. 

She’s suppressed the healing factor he gets from the latent presence of her chakra; she’s suppressed her chakra altogether, wrapping herself so deep in her chains that he can barely tell she’s there at all, and she does this at the same time as she rips viciously through his psyche, trawling up his worst, most traumatic memories and hissing blood-curdling threats of violence into the back of his mind.

Tobirama has to fight it – not because he’s slowly going insane with Matatabi laying siege to his own brain, but because he _knows_ that if he relaxes for even a moment, even _one_ second, if he lets himself be consumed by his emotions for even a fraction of a heartbeat, she’ll release her energy like a flood and fully possess him.

He’s learning lots of interesting things about being a jinchuuriki and for once in his life he fucking _hates_ having knowledge, but he takes advantage of it just to spite her. He’s got the storage scrolls and ink he’d taken with him when he left – both he and Kyashi decided that having a means to carry around necessities is important, even if they don’t really have anything _but_ the scrolls – and in between the migraines and the panic attacks and the episodes where he just whites out and barely manages to stay dominant, he begins to meticulously document this new phenomenon as clinically and impersonally as he can.

[The jinchuuriki’s relationship with the Beast is best when their reserves are somewhat connected, beyond the default chakra transfer that occurs through the seal. Large chakra reserves and well-developed coils seem to be, if not necessary, then very important for both the continued integrity of the prison seal and the continued survival of the host. (INSUFFICIENT DATA. THEORETICAL)]

[The more the jinchuuriki changes to accommodate the Beast, the more acclimated they will become to the foreign chakra, and the more they will be able to take advantage of the passive benefits of a sealed bijuu, that thus far seem to include but not necessarily be limited to:

  * Access to the bijuu’s chakra reserves (immense control and willpower required to take chakra by force)
  * Supernaturally enhanced healing abilities; extent unknown, but the chakra of the Beast can purportedly keep the jinchuuriki alive, if on the brink of death, in conditions that would kill a normal shinobi
  * Enhanced senses; strongest when actively channeling chakra, but once the Beast chakra enters the jinchuuriki’s system for the first time, there is permanent improvement to some degree
  * Enhanced physical prowess; strength, speed, balance, flexibility, endurance, constitution
  * Tendency to manifest physical traits of the bijuu when the connection between host and Beast is strengthened or the seal somehow weakened]



[…bijuu-specific traits…manifestation of blue fire, chakra cloak…fully retractable claws that can be extended and sharpened at will…temporary growth of fur (?) when the bijuu has more control than usual…species-inappropriate cravings and behaviors that become more prominent when the (energy) connection between jinchuuriki and bijuu is strong…]

[very angry she is so she i s very angry ther eis nothing that can be d one to stopher she can playwith me whene ver ,, however she wnts…she can be con trolled but at acost…thhe deep er she goes in the se a l the moreaccess she has to my body and th e less i can sense h er or controlher…]

[ **BIJJ-SOLENT-ORTA-LIA-LIARR-LIAR-VIL-CKI-TLE-MONST-I-ILL-ILL-Y-OU-WILL-------PAY FOR THIS IF I HAVE TO DESTROY MYSELF TO MAKE IT HAPPEN—OT-A-THRE-AT,,-IDIO-,,-A-PRRR-OMI-SE.** ]

Tobirama is almost dead when Matatabi finally quiets. This is a different silence from her angry, barely-hidden seething: it’s _frightening,_ how still and how noiseless she is in his chest cavity. He’s on the brink of starvation and is dipping into delusion when she retreats, and it’s all he can do to get food – raw fish – and drink from the ocean. His mind is so fragile and exhausted that he’s not sure of anything at all, and he definitely lacks the capacity to care about food poisoning or the dehydrating properties of salt water.

He wakes from a sleep he doesn’t remember falling into and for a moment he thinks the Nibi is altogether _gone_. Tobirama has to search deep, _deep_ within the Tartarus Seal to sense any trace of her at all, and he’s lost all awareness of her and her thoughts and emotions and actions.

It’s almost like he’s well and truly _alone._

He stays on that island for a week, sleeping on the beach and digging his claws into the seal-lines, trying to rouse Matatabi from whatever coma she’s dug herself into. It doesn’t work; of _course_ it doesn’t work, Matatabi is a _bijuu_ and Tobirama is _nothing_ – so he doesn’t…give _up,_ exactly, but he stops actively trying to reach out.

 

Tobirama barely has the energy to travel and keep himself alive at the same time. There is no conceivable way he could _hope_ to overpower Matatabi, not when she’s refusing to so much as acknowledge him.

Time passes. Tobirama shivers in his only set of clothing and is burnt red again and again and again by the shadowless sun as he travels north, drawn to Lightning Country like a lodestone and paying as little mind to his persisting injuries and sunburns as he can when there’s almost nothing else to focus on.

He slinks into a civilian town in the dead of the night, armed with his stealth and his sealing scroll, and he acquires proper shoes and shirts and pants and undergarments and wraps and _several_ haoris. He hangs onto life by the slimmest of threads sometimes, but he teaches himself to truly live off the land. He cuts down a bear one day using his new claws, which are rapidly becoming his favorite melee weapon, and he eats at it until the meat festers, and then he strips it to the bone with his growing carnassial teeth. 

He sleeps in its cleaned pelt and is almost _warm_ for the first time in a month. 

In tiny, growing increments, Tobirama learns to force Matatabi’s chakra from her by yanking sharply on their connection and refusing to bend to her anger and her malice. He takes barely a spark at first and when he’s acclimated to that, he takes a little more, and as time passes, he is strengthened.

Tobirama has never felt so hollow in his life. The pocket dimension in his ribcage feels like a polar vortex trapped beneath his sternum, and he didn’t know it was possible, but somehow Matatabi’s silence is _worse_ than her incessant torture.

Weeks go by. It’s only when Tobirama starts repetitively shredding into his own skin – his brain is foggy and his thoughts are muddied and he doesn’t really know who he is anymore, _what_ he is anymore, and something about the pain just sharpens him – that she relents.

When he draws his new talons repeatedly up and down and across his wrists, watching numbly as red trickles out to match his sealing tattoos, the cuts are healed when he wakes. Experimentally, he digs his sharpened thumbnail into the inside of his thigh, just to see what happens, and when it doesn’t close up any faster than normal, he shrugs it off as a fluke.

Every time Tobirama sleeps, all of his wounds, self-inflicted and otherwise, are completely gone, and the only redness staining his too-pale skin is the Tartarus Seal.

He runs all the way from Hot Springs Country to Lightning Country without stopping for rest, and he barely notices that he _can_ do that. His feet are rubbed raw and splintered and sliced open and his entire body _aches_ , lactic acid locking up his overworked muscles and stiffening his every movement. It doesn’t take him any longer than normal to fall asleep that night – the dreams, when they happen, aren’t _good,_ but he can rest through them – and when he rises, he feels better than he has in ages.

It takes Tobirama an almost embarrassing amount of time to realize that horrible void in his chest has been filled, and that he can once again feel Matatabi’s chakra coursing through him as it had before so long ago. He’d almost forgotten the sensation, but…the abrasive caustic scrub of her energy isn’t painful so much as bracing, and her cold flames don’t wildly affect his body temperature so much as cool down his heated muscles and warm up his ears and fingers.

He’s still locked out – he can _sense_ Matatabi in the seal-space now, he can sense the seal-space at all – but he _wonders._ He prides himself on his control of Water chakra, and it responds to him so readily because of his nature. His insatiable curiosity and burning drive to _understand,_ to _know_ the world and everything in it as much as he can connects him to the element.

He _understands_ Suiton in a way he understands nothing else, and – in the interest of science only – he considers applying his formidable intellect to the formidable problem of Matatabi and her reticence, and his own role in causing her to hole herself up.

It’s only once he begins trying day after day after day, spending his every waking moment sending different signals beneath his breastbone, broadcasting his thoughts and observations so constantly that it becomes second nature: it begins to snow, he likes the snow, he tells Matatabi that he likes the snow, he catches a snowflake on his tongue, he notices it’s cold, he tells Matatabi that it’s cold and he receives no response.

It’s only once he puts everything he has, every shred of effort he still holds on to into _understanding_ her the way he _understands_ the Water, the way he _understands_ combat, that she deigns to allow him in.

When the spring melt sets in – months after he’s escaped, months of living solely off the wilds – they’re speaking again. They can work together now in a way they couldn’t before, in a way Tobirama has never worked with _anyone_ before, and have come to an accord: Tobirama uses the Nibi’s chakra, he needs to use the Nibi’s chakra, he will use the Nibi’s chakra if she wants him to or not. Matatabi wants personal autonomy and hates having the last shreds of her own power ripped from her, she hates it when Tobirama treats her like a burden, she hates it when he exploits her for her power and refuses to acknowledge her otherwise.

Tobirama is always allowed to carry a set amount of Matatabi’s chakra within him at any given time, but he has to let it go freely if she demands it back. He is permitted to channel more of her chakra, to the extent that he physically begins to transform into her, as long as he asks beforehand. When their reserves merge to such an extent that they begin to merge too – the extent that leads to Tobirama developing his Matatabi-chakra-cloak and manifesting her tails and ears and paw pads – they cooperate as best as they can. 

It’s clumsy and awkward and often hostile, and Matatabi certainly is no _friend,_ but they _understand_ each other now. She takes the initiative to tell him more about chakra itself and how it actually works, and he listens devoutly and commits everything to memory. He indulges in her feline instincts and will occasionally do things for no reason better than _Matatabi_ feeling like doing it, and she hates him a little bit less every time.

* * *

 

INSIDE THE TARTARUS SEAL, [SENJU TOBIRAMA], PRE-FOUNDERS’ ERA

JUST AFTER THE GREAT ESCAPE

 

The brat finally collapses after almost a full day of sprinting, burning Matatabi’s energy up and forcing Matatabi herself deep, deep into the seal. She’d nearly lost her connection to him after he’d stolen some of her chakra for his own use, and the parasite tree regrows its red leaves now that his life-force is feeding it once more. 

He’s unconscious, and Matatabi takes great, great pleasure in digging her claws – _claws the bitch had the nerve to steal_ – into the depths of his brain, dragging up his worst memories from where they’d been suppressed. She forces him to rewatch the funerals of his young littermates, shoves him into recollections of encounters with that hellish man who spawned him, and then leaves him clinging onto those dreams when she exposes him to her own demons. 

When he wakes up after nearly eighteen hours, he’s screaming and his hairless body is slick with sweat. He’s also entirely out of chakra and stamina, but he at least possesses the good sense not to bother her for any or bother her at all. 

When Matatabi withholds her healing factor as much as she can – without it his ruined feet only recover marginally faster than the normally would – he does not retaliate. When she spites him with images of his Peanut and his human-Madara and his human-plant-Saiken all fallen beneath the fury of her talons, he only draws in shaky breaths and fails not to cry. 

Senju has stopped trying to get to his soulmate. He’s stopped traveling at all, only dragging himself around the island he seems to be trapped on and doing the bare minimum required of him to survive. He curls up to sleep on the soft, sandy beach, laying on his stomach like a starfish and so _vulnerable_ beneath the starry sky, so that he doesn’t aggravate his overworked limbs and shredded hind paws. He spends only as much time there as he has to, waiting and holding solemn vigil as his wounds slowly close up. 

Matatabi interacts with him often, but never beyond the extent that is required to turn his own mind against him, never beyond the extent that she has to in order to suppress the side effects her power gives him. He doesn’t deserve them, he never has, and he’ll never get to enjoy them again, not if she has any say in it.

Tobirama is an _alright_ survivalist. Matatabi is prohibited by the nature of her seal from keeping her chakra entirely to herself – he still has a diluted version of the enhanced senses he’d uncovered when he first channeled her energy, and she’s grateful for it, if only because his vision was truly _awful_ before and is now only mildly bad. He manages to recreate her phantom talons with his own chakra and uses them to catch himself food. Matatabi is sitting beneath his throat and above his gut, a position that allows her to close off his Fire chakra pathways entirely, so he eats them raw and endures the sickness that comes to humans when they don’t cook their meat. Her flames warm him from within, so he doesn’t bother with a campfire, an irritatingly sensible act that won’t send up literal smoke signals about his location. 

He sleeps through the freezing temperatures and lives to see the morning, and he doesn’t lose any of his extremities to frostbite – her inherent warmth seems to thaw him, and it frustrates her to no end.

It’s honestly _boring_ , doing nothing and spending all her time spiting Tobirama. It’s agonizing because she has access to his thoughts again and is witness to what exactly had been going through his mind at the time – a foolish, desperate plan, but Matatabi is not blinded entirely by hate, and she can recognize that there was likely no other way he was ever going to escape. It _is_ his fault for going berserk after he consumed her chakra; humans can’t really withstand that kind of power, and it fried his higher thinking faculties even as it made his body stronger and faster than it’s ever been.

He’s misplaced his kunoichi and cannot sense her now that his range is back to normal.

 _He’s_ lonely too, and that makes everything so much more unbearable. He can’t have the _gall_ to feel upset, not with what he’s done to Matatabi, but…

The Senju brat is a self-sacrificing little _bastard_ and she _hates_ him for lying to her, but he did it so that Kyashi could see Mito again, so that his dear ones could be happy, and what shocks Matatabi more than the impossible authenticity of those feelings is the inherent _humanity_ she senses at their core.

He doesn’t regret it – not for his own sake, although he is endlessly glad to be free of that miserable hole in the ground - but for others’. He imagines Hashirama cheering up when Mito returns to herself, imagines Kyashi meeting Tōka and the unstoppable, devastating _chaos_ that will come from that friendship, imagines his cousin getting to talk to That Bastard Izuna, and he feels no remorse.

Matatabi has never, _ever_ known humans to be kind. She has spent her life believing that the Sage was an outlier, that humanity as a whole is incapable of fostering love and generosity and selflessness for the sake of others. She has thought them greedy and cruel and short-sighted, only too willing to slash and burn and take what is not theirs for a chance at personal glory, and what incenses her the most is that she is both wrong and right.

She knows from Tobirama’s memories of his father and his largely uncaring Clan and the horror of the wars that there are many among them who are all of those bad things and more, but that there are also those like Hashirama, who reminds her unerringly of Saiken and is such an astoundingly giving, gentle soul that it sometimes hurts to think of him. She knows that it is possible to balance those two things, the goodness and the evil, and it is perplexing. 

She knows that Tobirama’s eighteen years on earth have been largely filled with death and loss and cruelty. She knows that he has locked up his conscious tight in the back of his head, so that it doesn’t interfere with his job. 

She knows that he believes in the possibility of peace with his whole heart, and that he wants it mostly for his precious people, that he thinks of _himself_ as a means to an end for those individuals.

Matatabi exists on contradictions, and in her millennia of life, she somehow never _learned_ this.

It’s something she spends a good deal of time thinking about. She doesn’t act on it, though, just keeps her solemn silence and waits and waits and waits. In her many centuries of life, Matatabi has come to know that patience is the key to success, doubly so for an ambush predator like herself, and she will not bother herself to fix the fraying bond between him until _he_ does.

It shocks her to no end that he spends so much time just pondering _her,_ examining their every interaction from every conceivable perspective in the moments where he’s not reliving nightmares in the day. It shocks her further when he _ignores his soulmark entirely_. He doesn’t even seem to _notice_ the searing pain of overprotective rage that burns across his back when he tries to turn his own thighs into sashimi. He doesn’t _notice_ the way human-Madara takes note of his own suffering and does his best to send back encouragement and determination in turn. He doesn’t really notice anything, absorbed as he is in his memories and his plotting and his endless consideration of whatever the hell _understanding_ is supposed to be. 

It happens. Every sensation, every idle thought, every simple musing the boy has, he begins to shove deep into the seal. He pours energy and contemplation and frustration into their bond to no end, and for a time, Matatabi cannot _escape_ his life, cannot do anything but watch as he shares his every day with her. The flood of information is disconcerting, but stranger still to her is the sudden core of stubbornness that wasn’t there before.

He approaches her like he does any other problem, and the mundanity of his methodical, repetitive questioning is comforting. He isn’t treating her like an aberration, has stopped looking at her any differently than he would his own experiments, something that is astoundingly deep. Senju is near _obsessed_ with learning and creating and questioning – when he sees a problem, he immediately thinks _solution,_ and it’s refreshing to know that she will receive that same tried-and-true process.

Matatabi breaks her own promise after a month or so. She’s never going to get out, never going to defeat him – Sage knows she’s spent enough time testing out her seal to have learned that by now – and it would be foolish and wasteful to continue acting like there’s ever going to be a chance that she can. 

It’s all the encouragement she needs to become more flexible, to bend where she would have broken. Matatabi waits for him to fall asleep – she’s been closing his awful cuts while he sleeps, soothing his aches, numbing his pains, but _only because she feels them too_ – and then she loosens the stranglehold she has on her end of the seal. 

Just enough for the kitten to notice, should he look. (He will. If there’s one thing Matatabi will never forget about Senju Tobirama, it is that he is infinitely curious about _everything_ , that he passes the days alone in the wilds by dreaming up impossibilities that he can one day make reality.)

Sure enough, he does, and he doesn’t smile when he notes her presence once more, but his scowl is not as icy as normal and some amount of the tension in his wiry limbs has relaxed. Matatabi’s decision to tentatively _consider_ a relationship with the human proves to be a good one when he doesn’t stop. He doesn’t stop once he gets her to open up, he doesn’t stop when he can access her chakra reserves once more, he just _doesn’t stop._ It’s endlessly obnoxious, but Matatabi has to have some measure of grudging approval for his sheer tenacity and scientific thoroughness.

The brat has taken to the habit of coming into her seal at least once every day, and she has slowly but surely inured herself to his continued presence. It does no good to let her temper get the better of her: she is the Two-Tails, she is refined and graceful and _better_ than losing her cool over a single human boy making a rash of bad decisions, even taking into account how they affected her. 

Against her will, the boiling hate she’s been stoking in her gut begins to cool little by little, and when it settles, the stakes in her paws become chillier, something that is _immensely_ soothing to her inflamed feet. The kitten has talked to her about altering the seal, but he was quick to disclaim that he can’t do it alone nor can he do it without many more resources than he already has.

The decision for him to return to Fire Country is a mutual one, fueled by their joint desire for a better, more functional seal and the kitten’s desire for _home-family-mate_.

The night before he’s set to leave Rai no Kuni, Tobirama dips into her seal-space again and inches closer to her hesitantly. [Matatabi?]

[ **what.** ]

[Thank you. For saving me earlier and for forgiving me. I’m sure you already know how I feel, but – I really am sorry, and I’d be dead without you.]

[ **…yes you would. dont thank me now, kitten. im going to teach you how to be the two-tails. there is every possibility you will still die, and im only doing it because there is literally nothing else to do, since im _trapped in your soul_ and all that.**]

[Goodnight, Matatabi.]

[ **hmmph.** ]

[You’re secretly nice, aren’t you? Like Tōka? You’re mean and terrifying and godlike, but you do _care_ , don’t you.]

[ **drop dead. if you speak to me again, human, ill _eat_ you.**]

Tobirama has the gall to smile up at her – it’s a _genuine_ smile too, and _damn him_ for cursing her with his rarest expression – before he retreats back into his own body and falls asleep almost instantly.

And Sage fucking _damn it_ that was _Peanut_ level manipulative garbage, Senju thinks he can get the better of _her—!_

If she kills him now, she’ll be wasting all that hard work she’s done, making him introspect so deeply and thoroughly and come to understand both her and himself, and frankly speaking, Matatabi is too _lazy_ to bother plotting or scheming right now. She is…not _content,_ but she isn’t being tortured, and that’s something she never could have expected.

* * *

 

AT A DISREPUTABLE TAVERN, SHIMO NO KUNI, PRE-FOUNDERS’ ERA

THE NEXT EVENING

 

Kakuzu has been making his living as a contracted killer and a bounty hunter. Not a shinobi – there’s no one who wants to hire him, unaffiliated and menacing as he is, but that’s alright. He’s more than able to survive off of death, and his spiders scout every hidden corner and cranny for rumors of the most _lucrative_ prizes. 

Currently, the highest bounty in the country – in _any_ country - is on the head of the Nibi’s jinchuuriki.

This is not a fact known to any but the Shogun, his most trusted associates, and the individuals he’s hired to track down his lost kitten. Furthermore, Kakuzu is perhaps the only person besides the Shogun himself who knows that the very same jinchuuriki is _Senju Tobirama_ , and that he’s vanished into nowhere; hasn’t been seen since he slipped through Minamoto’s claws months ago, but he hasn’t given up. 

This may be the most important job of his life. It even takes precedence over that failed mission not too long ago, the very same one that resulted in his technical expulsion from his former village and his acquisition of the Earth Grudge Fear.

He’s already more than willing to catch any kind of prey for five hundred _million_ ryō, but this one just so happens to bear the Senju name and is in fact the last living brother of Senju Hashirama, a person of some ambiguous, unimportant interest to Kakuzu, and no doubt someone who would do anything to have his beloved otouto safe at home, disregarding the expulsion. The man has an infamous bleeding heart, and while _that_ heart in particular is strictly off-limits – Kakuzu knows from experience just how difficult it is to even get _near_ it – surely, he’ll bend _just_ a little, just a _bit_ for whoever manages to find his missing brother, and perhaps even a bit more for his lost soulmate.

Kakuzu is most certainly not guilty of being that individual nor is he willing to consider the ridiculous notion that his life resembles some gritty, hard-core romance novel.

If he knew about Uchiha Madara’s relation to his quarry- 

…just better to say that it’s very good he doesn’t know. 

Kakuzu has an awful lot on his plate – beyond working on creating independent, detachable hosts for his new hearts, he’s trying to string together the insanely complicated job that is Senju Tobirama, and he’s _pretty_ sure he can pull something else off of this, but he doesn’t know how. He’ll just have to be patient, then, and wait for inspiration to wander into his web. 

He’s been spending most of his time with the spiders, and it shows.

He’s in the Land of Frost, now, following Hachime as she tracks the Nibi’s energy. It apparently left the highest Lightning Country mountains very recently and is bound due southwest if Senju keeps his course.

According to the weavings, tonight is the night it will come the closest to Kakuzu – tonight is the night he springs his trap.

Hachime’s setae are among the most delicately fine-tuned sensory organs that can be found in any creature, vertebrate or yōkai or not, and there is no better tool for any shinobi’s partner to possess. Kakuzu is aware that Senju will avoid any and all roads; to have escaped him months ago means that the boy does have _some_ measure of intelligence, so he can’t set up a webbed trap with his Earth Grudge Fear. Such a thing would be useless anyway. No competent ninja, especially not a former Clan heir who is both the host of a bijuu and a born sensor, would ever be caught _dead_ just walking into an obvious setup like that. It’s second nature to shinobi to counter the enemy’s stealth and subterfuge with their own, and only the very strongest – those like Senju Hashirama or Uchiha Madara or Kakuzu himself – are able to succeed in full-frontal attacks.

Hachime and Kakuzu are patrolling the craggy, snow-blanketed landscape, leaving no trace; thanks to the light weight and inherent grace of spiders, they can ghost over pristine snowbanks without so much as disturbing the drifts.

Senju Tobirama is a very good shinobi, and it is a credit to his subtlety that he himself is not known for his skills. It is a rare and powerful individual who manages to become a _famous_ ninja, and an even rarer person who can have that power and keep it somewhat secret. The albino has some name recognition – the story of how he killed his own father and ran away from his Clan is everywhere at this point – but not as anything beyond the God of Shinobi’s pale little brother. 

Not as a deadly cold wind that blows in the night and is damn near unstoppable, and certainly not as the jinchuuriki of the Two-Tails.

Truly, it is a complement to his raw skill and mastery over the hidden techniques that allows him to escape Kakuzu’s notice for so long, but he can’t fully suppress the burning star of the bijuu sealed within him, nor can he hope to avoid detection by Hachime and her all-seeing eyes. Insect summons are infinitely useful as invisible spies, and every decent shinobi knows to fear the fly on the wall.

Senju may be a sensor, but he skips over Kakuzu, buried as the bounty hunter is in the ambient chakra of the environment, and pays no mind to Hachime – there are spiders _everywhere_. The delightfully devious perk of arthropod summons is that there is almost no environment on earth that they can’t thrive in, and therefore almost no place where they can’t be expected to appear.

With, of course, the noticeable exception of any place that’s _cold_ , the Land of Frost being a very prominent example of this. Even the hardiest insects and arachnids won’t settle this far north, not even in summer, and despite this the mark just continues on his merry way, darting noiselessly through the night and utterly unaware that he’s being followed.

He’s almost impossibly fast, and Kakuzu will admit that keeping up with him while simultaneously not giving himself away proves to be nearly as difficult as surviving a fight with the young man’s elder brother who he _cannot_ be thinking about right now, but he manages.

The Nibi is restless within its seal, and the near-constant turmoil of its chakra keeps Kakuzu on constant edge, but it doesn’t see anything out of place any more than its jinchuuriki does, and while it seems to believe there is a threat somewhere, it can find no evidence to support that. Tobirama stays on the move, and Kakuzu is vividly reminded of that fight with Hashirama a few months back and how he’d had to nearly turn himself into a plant to keep from being noticed.

It takes over an hour flying along the wilds at a truly grueling pace for Senju to encounter a roadblock that’s able to slow him down – a wide-mouthed gorge, the edges slick with black ice and the bottom of it invisible from the top. 

He stops, just for a moment, just to better examine this obstacle, and Kakuzu wastes no time, not when there is no time to waste. He sneaks as close as he dares before he lets the threads of his Earth Grudge Fear burst out to ensnare his prey, who _almost_ manages to leap out of the way, _almost_ gets to safety in time, but— 

The boy’s wearing _sandals_ for some reason, and he slips on the ice. No force in the world can free him from the grip of gravity, and when he falls, Kakuzu is already there to catch him. He burns through nearly a third of his stockpiled threads with that vicious aura of his pet Beast, but Kakuzu will not be deterred, and Senju is restrained easily enough when his air supply is cut off. The Two-Tails rages, but it is helpless to do anything more, and it cannot prevent him from scooping up his subdued quarry and wrapping the body so carefully and intricately in the Jiongu silks that he’s disabled _just_ enough to stay relatively still, but not _so_ much that he’s in any danger of dying from strangulation. Kakuzu would be lying if he said he wasn’t immensely proud of the results of his own work – being able to control the Earth Grudge Fear to the extent required for the chakra vessels to be blocked but not cut off entirely has proved extremely difficult, and this is actually the first time he’s successfully managed it.

He hauls up Senju onto his shoulder, gives Hachime a thankful wink for her great help in the hardest part of his mission, and returns to the inn before sunrise, drawing only a few stares with his possession of what must appear to be a very odd mummy.

Kakuzu’s Mark – an enormous oak tree that spans his chest from shoulders to hips – _itches_ ferociously like poison ivy, but Hashirama can just _shut the fuck up_ , since he’s gonna have his brother back soon enough. It’s hardly _Kakuzu’s_ fault that tracking him down and catching him was so hard and required judicious application of Earth Grudge Fear, and it’s not like he has any control over the way Senju chooses to behave as a prisoner, i.e. _very_ ungraciously.

He’s not actually gagged, and Kakuzu is woken up the next morning by a soft, raspy voice promising him an excruciating death a hundred times over in the event that he should remove the bindings. 

“You’re supposed to be a genius, aren’t you? Please tell me you can understand _why_ I’m not just going to let you go and give up my reward so that you can kill me,” he replies, something that infuriates his charge so thoroughly that Tobirama spends the next three _hours_ just hissing various threats at him, apparently not pleased with how he’s being carried around everywhere.

Carting his ass around the inn and then the town is incredibly trying and Kakuzu’s shoulders are starting to hurt under the persistent assault of the jinchuuriki’s bony elbows, but he enjoys the _stares_ they draw far too much to consider his own comfort until they’re back on the road.

Unsurprisingly, the first thing Senju does when the threads loosen the barest amount is try to attack him, but his entire body is still restrained; Kakuzu is just generous enough to reattach the silken bonds to his own self and strategically relax most of the others, leaving Senju able to walk on his own but with no use of his arms, which are tied uncomfortably across his back, or his chakra, which is still suppressed by the consistent pressure of the threads on his tenketsu points. He looks like he might be a mere moment away from willingly garroting himself at the indignity of being _leashed_ to Kakuzu like a rowdy child, but he at least has the sense to stop actively presenting himself as a rowdy child.

The Nibi is no more impressed with their circumstances, and he is abruptly introduced to her when she uses his own strings to broadcast her chakra into his head.

[ **tell your demonic spider-mother that i will kill her for this. i will rip off all of her legs and _eat_ them, and when im done, itll be _your_ turn.**]

[Alright,] Kakuzu replies, already tired of this fucking mission and the fucking jinchuuriki even though it’s been barely half a day. [No need to be rude, kitten, I’m taking your meatsuit back _home._ I have business with the God of Shinobi.] 

Of course, since the fucking cat snitches him out the moment she retreats to Senju, he _immediately_ starts freaking out about whatever he assumes Kakuzu wants from his anija.

“Wait, wait, _what_ the hell kind of business do you have with Hashirama? Are you _sure_ it’s with _Hashirama?_ Anija’s never had a real job in his _life_ and he’ll probably kill you if you bring me back like this. By _hugging_ the life out of you. I actually kind of hope that happens, because you deserve such an undignified death—” 

“Stop talking or I’ll gag you,” he grunts in answer, which naturally does _nothing_ to keep the boy quiet and actually encourages him to run his mouth _more._

Kakuzu learns how to meditate while moving out of sheer necessity, and the three days that it takes them to reach the heart of Fire Country are the longest three days of his entire life. He’s heading there partially to keep Senju a little more obedient and partially because there’s no real reason he _shouldn’t_ , not with the myriad of opportunities holding a jinchuuriki captive grants him.

His plan is only half-complete – he _wants_ the obscene amount of money he’ll get by turning Senju in to the Shogun, but he’s also currently in the sole possession of the world’s only jinchuuriki with no one to make him let the kid go, which means he could do whatever he wants with him. Surely there’s a higher bidder out there willing to pay several lifetimes’ worth of fortunes for Tobirama and his power, and maybe his looks too, but Kakuzu isn’t _completely_ heartless – the opposite, actually – and the thought of selling him as some kind of gladiator/sex slave is just repulsive. 

This makes his tree-Mark flutter with approval, which is _definitely_ not the reason he ultimately decides to do as he’d been considering and take the brat back to his anija. It’ll grant him good standing with the Senju and access to Hashirama, and if he does realize he wants the money more than he wants happiness later on, he’ll know where to find the boy. He has no doubt that once his soulmate gets hands back on his little brother, the man will never let him go, not with the honestly impressive amount of trouble he’s gotten into in barely a single season, but for some reason that’s not a deterrent. 

They’re barely an hour out from the Senju compound and Tobirama is getting dangerously twitchy when Kakuzu realizes that the trouble hasn’t just _stopped_ , and that there may have been some factors he neglected to consider when he chose to come to Hi no Kuni.

The Kyuubi is awake in a way it hasn’t ever been before. It is _outraged_ to note the presence of a fellow Tailed Beast within its range and subdued by a human, and it seems completely, wholly willing to unleash that anger on Kakuzu.

He can go toe-to-toe with the God of Shinobi, but even the God of Shinobi is no match for the Nine-Tails in an episode, and it’s only his finely-honed survival instincts that save him from its massive, snarling jaws. 

Kakuzu abandons Senju. The boy should be well-protected by his Nibi, and it _is_ still true that he was the person to bring the kid all this way – he can capitalize on that later, and there will always be another job to take. 

It would be a very poor investment to risk everything he’s worked so hard for, all of the effort that’s gone into his training and his reputation and his still-new Earth Grudge Fear, and Kakuzu doesn’t want to lose all of his hearts to a vengeful god. 

He bolts back to the northeast, staying well away from both Taki and Konoha, and does his best to remain unaware of any news that comes from the forests. It doesn’t entirely work; Kakuzu still knows that the Kyuubi has not been placated, still knows that it’s reducing a good portion of Fire Country to ashes and dust. 

He sleeps and he dreams about his own Clan, the screaming and the suffering as they burned to death, eaten alive by his flames, and he is not comforted by the parallels that situation shares with this one. There’s no real relief in knowing that the Nine-Tails is the one to be bringing such chaos to so many innocents, and there is no joy knowing that it isn’t Kakuzu himself forcing Senju Hashirama beyond all human limits. 

The man is keeping his people alive through sheer force of will and is one of maybe a handful of ninja who can hold off the bijuu.

All Kakuzu can do is ignore the smoke he imagines he can smell through his Bond and firmly demand of Senju that he remains invincible and unkillable, despite all logic telling him that there is not a single person who could possibly do that, not even Hashirama.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kakuzu: heartless bastard, notorious mercenary, professional  
> kakuzu: sees literally one plant or anything brown or a word that sort of sounds like senju  
> kakuzu: <3<3<3<3<3<3<3<3<3<3  
> kakuzu: FUCK i mean die  
> hashirama, half a world away: :(


	15. now i am the violence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Kyuubi no Kitsune unleashes hell. Uchiha Madara has an interesting week and proves to be very weak under pressure. Senju Tobirama gets in a fistfight with a god. Uzumaki Mito has absolutely no difficulties doing the impossible.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok Folks It's Happening. It's Happening. fucking 15 chapters 70K+ words and finally,,,,, They Meet
> 
> its probably anticlimactic but sometimes life really do be like that
> 
> remember that thing from chapter 6 where madara gets a hint of what hashirama will do to people who look at tobi? he gets another hint now and he doesn't really like it
> 
> tobirama is catra i dont make the rules. is this just one long big excuse to write neko!tobira??? no but how fucking funny would that be lmaooooooo
> 
> i just remembered ive not been writing a whole lot of this cause im already workin on madatobi week 2019......just wondering if i stockpile a couple of chapters would yall like them to be posted?? like as im writing this its february 14 which is Some Time Before August

IN THE DEEPEST HEART OF THE SACRED KONOHA FORESTS, HI NO KUNI, PRE-FOUNDERS’ ERA

RIGHT AFTER THE KIDNAPPING

 

Kurama is jolted from sleep by the presence of Matatabi on the bijuu plane for the first time in _months_. Kokuō has kept a similar silence, but at least _they_ have a reason for it, a reason that he knows and can rest on when he worries for his skulk.

Matatabi just _vanished_ , there one moment and gone the next, and none of them have been able to catch any minute trace of her – not Kurama with his keen nose, not Chōmei with her compound eyes and leaf-like wings, not Gyuuki with their hypersensitive tentacles. The Hachibi especially has been aggrieved by Matatabi’s absence – they inhabit the eastern seas, stalking the depths of the ocean from Kumo to Tea Country, and they’ve always been geologically the closest to her.

They swear that she never left the mountains, that they were aware of her presence in the peaks as they always were and then they just – _weren’t_. Kurama knows they’re telling the truth; there was no rancid odor of lies obscuring Gyuuki’s scent of salt and forested tundra, and the ushi-oni doesn’t really see the point to deception anyway.

Kurama had scoured the plane looking for her, tracking nothing-nothing-nothing where there should have been cold fire and thundersnow – he’d just given up and gone back to sleep a week ago, by human time.

Now Matatabi returns, and she has been _fouled_ by the mortals, hurt and caged and injured in the worst ways. They’ve done _something_ to her mind, as well, because she insists that she’s come to grips with her situation as much as possible, and she refuses to try breaking the seal that has held her captive and separated her from their skulk.

She sits primly in the mouth of Kurama’s den and meets his eyes levelly, cool and collected and entirely unaware of the depth of the sickness that has poisoned her thoughts.

[ **you dont understand, kurama,** ] she tells him, when he leaps at her and demands answers. [ **i am trapped. trapped _outside_ of existence altogether and in the seal, which by nature makes it _impossible_ for me to ever escape. if the kitten were to die or the seal itself destroyed, nothing would change. the only thing that would do is eliminate the last bond i have. i would still be here, disconnected from everything, forever.**]

[ **impossible. do not lie, matatabi, allow us to find you and free you. it’s a disgrace, knowing about your imprisonment and not doing anything about it. it defiles our name.** ]

For some reason, Matatabi looks briefly _upset_ when he says that, but before he can ask her about it, she swishes her tails at him and changes the subject.

[ **there is actually something you can help me with. tobirama-kitten has been seized by a bounty hunter and immobilized with the earth grudge fear. i dont know how the man got it or what jorōgumo was _thinking,_ continuing to give it out to humans, but its keeping us well and truly trapped, and we cant do anything by ourselves.**] 

Kurama sniffs imperiously at her. He _knows_ Matatabi only has two tails, knows that she is the second-weakest of their number, but to fall so low as to _care_ about her human jail? It’s despicable, absolutely disrespectful to the power given to her by the Sage, and he wants nothing to do with it.

[ **i want nothing to do with it,** ] Kurama tells her, like she should have known he would. [ **your human is your business now and yours alone. it is no fault of mine that it’s been kitnapped.** ] 

[ **it _is_ your fault that i might have to _stay_ this way, bastard! you can do something about it – anything, _anything at all._ just showing up and baring your teeth at the spider-human will more than likely suffice and it will cost you _nothing!_ tobirama was _right,_ this is no _family._ _his_ hashirama-anija would end the world for him, you know, and _you_ cant bother yourself to put any bit of effort into giving me what freedom i can have.**]

[ **you – matatabi, what is _wrong_ with you, why are you defending the humans. why are you defending _the_ human who is your prison? i’m not going to save you, not if you’re going to hang yourself up on the mortals’ ideals and turn your back on the Sage. he said we were family and _so we are._ this is not up for debate, witch.**]

[ **…the sage was a human too. have you forgotten that? it would upset him if he could see you now, throwing around your tails like that makes you right, clinging to your small-mindedness and your hate-** ]

[ ** _enough_ , matatabi,**] Kurama roars, his pelt bristling with the _disrespect-!_ [ **you have no right to disparage that man and what he did for us, _no right_ to muddy his memory with your sappy _bullshit._ i don’t give a fuck if you want to _care_ about the other beasts, i don’t fucking _care_ if you think we should be _friends,_ but you cannot, you _will not_ just accept your own backslide into dementia and then have the _gall_ to try and infect me, your _better,_ with it-**]

Matatabi meets his eyes, and Kurama’s many centuries of life do not give him any understanding of the emotion he sees there. It just makes him _angry_ , that she would hurl around wild accusations at humans and then turn on her tails and try to meow an apology like she isn’t betraying _everything_ the Sage of Six Paths intended for them.

She just disappears, runs away back to her _human_ without so much as bothering to respond, and in the blaze of his fury Kurama forgets that he’d _just_ sworn _not_ to go find Matatabi – the only thing on his mind is the red haze of his temper. 

When he wakes, it is great and terrible, and the ancient forest around his den _burns._

He is so very, very _angry_ with the humans, so disgusted that they would _dare_ to poison his sister with their impudence that he pays no mind to the humans themselves, which proves to be a mistake. 

Kurama is almost _beaten._

There’s a dark-skinned man wearing the Senju crest who is powerful in the manner of the Sage, who reminds the Kyuubi so unerringly of Hagoromo that he cannot bring himself to extinguish the upstart once and for all. He has to spend all of his energy just remaining out of their clutches, anyway; he is assaulted day after night after day by some kind of Nature Release he’s never seen before that leeches away his chakra. Only the sheer volume of his power allows him to remain fighting, and this – this kind of skill is something he has _never_ seen before, not in humans.

A tiny red-headed woman wears a _dress_ when she fights him, but it takes Kurama too long to recognize her as an Uzumaki. He’s nearly trapped in her chakra chains, almost sealed away entirely by some technique she uses in conjunction with another kunoichi, and he hates hates _hates_ her for looking up at _him_ like that. He’s the size of the Uzumaki’s _island_ and still she stares _down_ at him, the cast of her eyes _disappointed_. He has never felt _small_ before – never in his life has he been belittled, and he comes to find he does not care for it. 

Kurama is enraged enough, blinded enough by raw, unfiltered fury, to try and snap at the Uchiha next. He’s been holding this one and his kin off for the entire time, but he makes the mistake of attempting _direct_ combat, and the Eye of Hypnotism ensnares him in its hold for three whole seconds.

Kurama is not proud to admit it, but once he’s finished bellowing long streams of flame out over the humans he _cannot kill_ , he turns tails and makes for Matatabi, whose chakra is noticeable in his forest and who has a great deal to answer for.

He forgets that he’s doing exactly what she wants him to when he chases away the spider-human that has leashed her jinchuuriki to him with his body silks. He’s far too focused on the jinchuuriki itself, an albino creature Matatabi has infected with her feline grace.

Kurama is the Nine-Tails, the most powerful being to have ever existed since the age of the Juubi and the Sage has passed, and the boy – _also_ a Senju, why are all of these fucking _Clans_ trying to bite Kurama in the ass – meets his gaze without fear. 

When he brings his claws down to just _crush_ it, no chakra necessary, it flashes away fractions of a moment before it would have died and does _something_ to alter the nature of its seal, because suddenly Kurama is hyperaware of Matatabi’s chakra lighting up the fūinjutsu from within, and somehow, impossibly, she _appears_ , the small pale form of her Senju kitten completely obscured beneath her. 

[ **you _lied!_** ] he roars. He has never been so angry in his _life,_ and that Matatabi – Matatabi, who is only the _Nibi_ – would dare to challenge him and insult the _Sage_ in doing so itches like a rash beneath his fur. 

[ **sorry,** ] the witch says, casually and without inflection, [ **i cant have you killing this one. ive put a lot of effort into him, and its important that hi no kuni survives. his _family_ is here and he cares about them, and i wont let you take that away from him.**]

The crackle of the fires raging below the feet of the bijuu fades away, and when Kurama meets Matatabi’s bicolored glare, he sees a conviction there, a determination so strong that it nearly bowls him over. She is by no means any match for him – she is also cool and logical and knows not to take on a fight she obviously won’t win, but – still she stands, opposing _him_ with her two tails, her _only_ tails, lashing back and forth.

[ **there is nothing here for _you._ go home, matatabi, take your human with you if you want, but do not presume that you can keep me from acting how i will in my own territory.**]

[ **no. i have business here thats nothing to do with you and i wont be able to do it if you just destroy everything because youre throwing a fit. let me pass, kurama.** ] 

Matatabi will not be swayed from her beliefs, not when she has the Senju brat leaking human stubbornness into her head. Kurama will have to stop her, but to do so properly he’ll have to give _this_ fight all of his attention, which will create an opening for the other humans.

When Matatabi pounces, he doesn’t hesitate before he leaps up to meet her with his claws outstretched.

 

* * *

  

WHERE THE CITY OF KONOHAGAKURE WILL EVENTUALLY BE BUILT, HI NO KUNI, PRE-FOUNDERS’ ERA

ONE WEEK AFTER THE BIJUU BEGIN TO FIGHT

 

Madara is going insane. He’s trying to keep it together, even succeeding to a degree, but the flood of sensations from his Mark and the _impossibilities_ swirling around his head make it unreasonably difficult to even _focus_ , let alone prepare himself for the assault on the bijuu, something he’ll be leading alongside Hashirama and Mito. The witch Kyashi and her inferior magic eyes have led them to this specific plan, this one crazy thing, and Madara has barely even _thought_ about it.

The Nibi clashes with the Kyuubi miles to the north, the two Tailed Beasts running each other ragged and causing so much collateral damage that Hashirama will be stuck repairing the forests for months if not years. The wild storms of chakra they throw out into the atmosphere has been the root of a week-long headache, and the distant buzzing explosions of the bijūdama are nearly blinding.

Madara has not noticed, because in his sensor’s sight, the Nibi no Bakeneko is _familiar._ When he notes its chakra signature, the specific rush of thundersnow-moonshine-eclipse, he recognizes it.

He feels it simmering beneath the surface of his soulmark and subtly shifting the color of the water dragon to a deeper, richer blue, another thing he can barely think about.

Madara’s _soulmate_ is the Two-Tails’ _jinchuuriki_. Madara’s soulmate is fighting the Kyuubi no Kitsune almost _singlehandedly_ as he sits and watches it happen. Madara’s soulmate is intrinsically connected to a big blue cat the size of his _house_ , and now they wear its form – the cloak of bijuu-chakra is more noticeable than the constant hum of his soulmate’s chakra, something that he believes indicates that the Nibi is closer to the surface of the seal than is normal.

Madara’s soulmate might be dying. It’s been almost a week since the Nibi appeared and engaged with the Kyuubi, and he has no idea how it’s managed to last so long against an entity so much more powerful than it, let alone how it’s successfully drawn the fox’s attention _away_ from the human settlements in the area. They must be breathtakingly powerful to contain that chakra, control that chakra, but six days have passed, and Kyashi still says it isn’t yet time, it isn’t yet safe for even he and Hashirama to get too close to the bijuu. He’s been in a horrible mood lately, even more than usual, and the violent roil of his chakra is agitated and anxious and infuriated at his own uselessness. Even Kagami avoids him now – it breaks his heart to know that he’s scared away even that little boy, who has a bright, compassionate heart second only to _Hashirama’s_ , but the ever-present worries about his love always distract him. 

Mito has created her own jinchuuriki seal with the assistance of her wife, who was apparently responsible for the binding of the Nibi to _Madara’s soulmate._

He would slam her up against the wall and _choke_ the jinchuuriki’s identity out of her, but Mito would kill him and Hashirama would cry and she’s already said that the Two-Tails’ container will live once they’ve done their duty.

Every time she walks past him and shoots him narrow-eyed glares, Madara imagines what it would be like to watch her _die,_ sliced in two by his gunbai or burnt to ashes by his Katon or savaged by his bare hands. She fucking _knows,_ she _knows_ his soulmate, was _imprisoned alongside his soulmate_ , and she refuses to share a name or even any hint.

Of course, his soulmate knows her too and _likes_ her if their disapproval of Madara’s problem-solving methods is any indication. For them and them alone he’ll let Kyashi live, but he refuses to look at her or talk to her or share a room with her, and she seems perfectly happy to reciprocate.

It’s not like she isn’t busy anyway, helping Mito finalize what is to be called the Byakugō, the Strength of a Hundred. It’s a more streamlined version of Kyashi’s original bijuu seal, the one Madara knows by the pulses of emotion streaming through his Bond, and again it makes him endlessly livid that _his_ soulmate is stuck with a seal inferior to the one _her_ soulmate will bear. Mito, of course, seems to know exactly what Madara is thinking at any given moment and her attitude towards him has cooled considerably, but she keeps to herself regardless. 

The Yin Seal is completed, and Mito is preparing her body to receive the strongest and angriest of the bijuu, a true force of nature and a demon in its own right. It is this sacrifice, this restraint of the Kyuubi, that will free the Nibi’s jinchuuriki from battle at long last, so he has consented to the plan and will play his part. It still makes his skin itch to watch the two kunoichi plaster themselves together and be casually intimate in a way he _can’t_ be, and it’s not technically _their_ fault he doesn’t know his own soulmate, but he still hates them for it.

Hashirama is extremely upset by the recent falling-out between his wife, her wife, and Madara, but he’s busy creating structures to house the many people who have lost their homes to the disasters and helping Izuna and Tōka try to keep the peace. There is no amicable grease to ease the interactions he has with those witches, nothing keeping him from clashing with them nastily every time they meet, so he’s been keeping to himself, locked away in his chambers and spending most of his time meditating, concentrating on his Bond. 

There is such _agony_ that it steals the breath from Madara’s chest, such _loneliness_ and regret that he has to physically stop himself from storming up to the Nine-Tails by himself and demand it to _stop_ , because it’s hurting _his soulmate._

He paces his bedroom like a caged tiger and nearly takes Izuna’s head off when he pokes it in to inform him that it’s finally time.

The look in his large, dark eyes is concerned, but Madara focuses on the _fear,_ fear his little brother feels upon seeing him, fear that _he_ has caused. He can’t bear to say goodbye, not when Izuna looks at him like that, so he just stomps brusquely past and straps on his armor as he goes.

It’s a ten-minute journey at a high speed to where the two bijuu have been wrestling and clashing for the past seven days, and it is both the longest and shortest interval of time Madara has ever known. The closer they get, nearer they run, the more the vice-like grip in his chest tightens, the more his soulmark hurts.

It feels like an eternity before he bursts through the trees on Hashirama’s heels, dodging and weaving around the explosion of Mokuton he’s producing, but he forgets that entirely when the Nibi finally runs out of the energy it needs to maintain its form and the jinchuuriki, Madara’s soulmate, the person he’s been waiting for and longing for his entire damn _life_ , comes falling out of the sky, shrouded in flickering blue and appearing to Madara’s chakra-sense like a star gone supernova. 

It’s every cliché at once and it isn’t. It’s the kind of thing he’s felt before, but only so long ago, eleven years in the past, and he’s so distracted by the energy burning him up from the inside out that he gets himself bitten by the Kyuubi- 

-except he _doesn’t,_ because in a blur of caustic chakra and snowmelt-lemongrass-mountain peak, his soulmate is _right there,_ summoning a Suiton – a long ribbon of water that takes shape as it coalesces into a _dragon_ – and hurling the jutsu right into the Kyuubi’s face, knocking it back with an unholy screech.

He’s so, _so_ grateful for his Sharingan. He can’t even remember what the hell he’s supposed to be doing beyond just _staring_ , totally forgetting the genjutsu he should be using on the Kyuubi. Madara has stumbled to the ground, knocked onto his ass by the force of the blow, and the only thing he knows is the silhouette before him, a tall, whipcord-thin shinobi encased entirely in the Nibi’s energy. He’s crouched down low, and the shapes of long claws jutting out of his raised fists are visible, and he is _everything._ The fluid flow of muscle as he fights, the blinding glow of fūinjutsu shining through his shirt, the hypnotic sway of two long tails.

It’s dangerously irresponsible and so, _so_ stupid to be _sitting down and ogling_ the jinchuuriki in an _active war zone_ , but when the ninja turns around, when Madara _finally_ gets to see his _face_ after over a decade spent searching for him, everything falls into place. He can practically hear a background orchestra producing dramatically swelling music, and- 

-and then his brain catches up to the rest of him and he recognizes the narrow, finely-crafted face of Senju Tobirama snarling down at him to _move,_ like – like – Madara doesn’t have the wherewithal to come up with a proper comparison, there _is_ no proper comparison, because this creature is the most _perfect_ thing that’s ever happened to him. 

The overwhelming flood of _everything_ is just too much, and Madara actually faints, falling unconscious to the ground even as the Nine-Tails thrashes in rage in front of him.

 

* * *

 

 

Mito has never withstood higher stakes in her life and it’s possible she never will again. Hashirama has managed to secure the Kyuubi with his Mokuton while it was still reeling from the Suiton dragon, the Nibi’s jinchuuriki appears to have _killed_ Madara, and Kyashi is holding her hands, joining the flow of their chakra and easing open the Byakugō on her forehead.

It’s something of an echo of Kyashi’s Mark, the shining sun meant to represent Mito herself, in that the location where they’ve decided to construct the seal is her forehead. Embers fly everywhere, painting Kyashi in a hundred shades of red-orange-gold. It’s uncomfortably hot and they’re both sweating, but it doesn’t matter – the Yin Seal is coming to life, and it requires their attention.

Raw chakra courses through Mito’s being, gathering a few inches above her nose. She’s forcing her body to not react, her heart to slow down, her blood not to thunder through its veins with such intensity. It’s only once she has complete control over herself that she will have complete control over the Byakugō. It is only once she has mastered this new seal that she can save the country from the menace of the Nine-Tails.

Strangely enough, it’s _easy._

For all that the Byakugō requires more chakra to be activated than she or Kyashi both possess, there is no threat of death, not with the storage tattoos decorating her soulmate’s body glimmering and charging the both of them with stockpiled energy. For all that her husband is a few yards away, singlehandedly restraining the mightiest of the bijuu and killing himself in doing so, Mito is more serene than she can ever remember being – calmer than she was even as a child on Uzushio, sheltered away from the wars and the fighting and the world at large.

Purple-black sealing lines pulse down Mito’s face, forming a lattice that spreads across her body. She’s just barely got a hold of the seal when Kyashi disconnects from her and then begins to tune her in to the Mokuton binding the kitsune, and though it struggles out of her grasp, she is stubborn and determined and she does not let it go.

The Kyuubi _screams_ , steam emanating from its body where it touches the wooden restraints, but the sound dies as its form flickers once, twice, thrice, and then vanishes altogether.

The violent influx of its energy nearly knocks Mito over, but she keeps her footing and forces the bijuu into her Byakugō, suppressing its will and its fury and everything else it tries to throw at her.

It takes a total of five minutes, start to finish, for Mito to lock the Kyuubi into the Yin Seal and slam it shut, gasping out for breath as Adamantine Chains hold the fox in place and withstand the force of its outraged thrashing.

When she comes to minutes later Kyashi is wrapped around her like an octopus, the dying flames of the Kyuubi’s rampage casting shadows and firelight onto her face, and Mito is honestly _breathtaken._ The warmth in her lovely, heavy-lashed eyes is balm to Mito’s soul against the blood running down her cheeks and nose and the exhaustion clear in every line of her, but that _doesn’t matter,_ because she’s _here_ and she’s _okay_ and not even the Nine-Tails could take her away from Mito. 

They don’t kiss, not right now; they just relax into each other’s hold with their Marked foreheads pressed together, breathing in the smell of charcoal and sweat and vaporized blood and _victory._ It’s one of the best moments of Mito’s life, and she is so calm, so tranquil – the furious killing intent of the Kyuubi is _nothing_ in the face of her love, and the longer they stay tangled together on the ground like that, the easier it becomes for her to lock the monster ever deeper away. Within the Byakugō, the Nine-Tails has stopped roaring; Adamantine Chains are wrapped around every single part of its body, lacing under and over and under each other in one giant elaborate knot that renders it immobile. When Kyashi closes all of her eyes and relaxes, going boneless and vulnerable and trusting in Mito’s arms, it is silenced altogether.

“Meets.”

“Hmm?”

“Guess what.”

“You’re developing some kind of mad scheme to get yourself a bijuu too so we can match?”

“Oh, shit, _no,_ I mean that’s a _horrible idea_ – no, I just wanted to tell you that I love you. I don’t think I say it enough but it’s always true. It always has been and it always will be. I’ve Seen it.”

“…I love you too, Kyashi.”

Their lovely, gentle moment of bonding and reconnecting is shattered by Hashirama, who is screeching like he’s being flayed alive and radiating so much killing intent that the Kyuubi couldn’t possibly dream of overcoming him. Mito might be imagining things, but she thinks it’s a little impressed by the sheer _rage_ he radiates.

They detangle themselves and Mito helps Kyashi to her feet, and from this angle she can see-

Oh.

_Oh._

Well. That’s certainly not how she expected to find Tobirama, but something impish within her says that they _have_ to find a way to make Kyashi a jinchuuriki too, now, if only so that they have a matching set.

Tobirama is collapsed awkwardly on top of Madara, and his thin shirt had been burnt away completely by the Nine-Tails, exposing the soulmark on his back – the soulmark that Hashirama has never seen in its entirety, the soulmark that brands Uchiha Madara’s Eternal Mangekyō Sharingan across his shoulderblades in what is quite possibly the _least_ subtle Marking Mito has ever _seen._ She’s never heard of anyone whose Mark is just their soulmate’s _name,_ but if it’s never happened, then that’s probably the closest thing possible. 

Her dear husband is wreathed in a cloud of emerald-green chakra that rapidly condenses and writhes around him. He’s scooped an unconscious Tobirama up and away from Madara, who is being rather rudely awakened by the giant, thorny vines that explode from the ground to grip him in a stranglehold. 

“Well,” says Kyashi, squinting at the absolute scene the Senju brothers are causing, “I didn’t know what was going to happen when That finally came out, but this was _not it._ ”

“Disagree,” Mito counters flatly. “Hashirama has spent practically every night since Tobirama left wailing about how he’s never going to let his beloved otouto out of his sight _ever again_ when he returns, and I can’t imagine any universe where he’d gracefully accept Madara and Tobirama as a Bonded pair. You really _do_ turn off your hearing aids when he comes to bed, don’t you?”

Kyashi turns to give her a Look, but it would seem Madara is finally coming to – did he actually _faint?_ Holy _shit,_ he’s never going to live this down – and he is not reacting gracefully to Hashirama going batshit insane and trying to kill him.

Tobirama is still unconscious, and Mito’s pretty sure she sees him drooling where he’s been tossed over his brother’s shoulder like a sack of rice. He’s going to be _so mad_ he missed this – she has no doubt he’s rehearsed reactions for scenarios like this at least a hundred times.

Madara has the advantage in combat, since he’s used much less chakra than Hashirama and is not carrying a fully grown man with one arm, but the Senju still manages to put up a good, scrappy fight. It’s _interesting,_ to say the least, to see the way Hashirama is forced to beat back the Susanoo with jutsus that only require one hand to perform, but the rage of combat drowns out whatever tragically emotional nonsense they’re shouting, and it’s quickly getting boring.

“Cover for me,” Kyashi says grimly, and Mito barely has time to agree before she’s darting away towards their husband, sweeping his legs out from under him with the shaft of her yari, catching Tobirama as gently as she can, and simultaneously flinging a vicious Fuuton over at Madara and where he’s getting _ideas_ about what should happen to Tobirama now. Just before the giant armored fist of Susanoo crushes her like a melon, he seems to remember that she’s hefting his _soulmate_ up onto her back, and he looks like he might faint again. 

It’s not really that hard for them to get back to the Senju compound with the two strongest shinobi of their generation throwing titanic, overpowered temper-tantrums to rival the bijuu they’d just been assigned to suppress. It’s even easier to hand a groggy Tobirama over to a shell-shocked Tōka with the guarantee that she’ll keep him safe, if not hidden – if either of the boys stop by and try to demand things of her, she’s more than capable of beating them both into the ground if she’s fast enough, and she’ll have Izuna as back-up. Mito’s faith in her is unshakeable, and there is likely no better way to scare a battle-crazed, lovestruck Uchiha Madara away from his soulmate than making out enthusiastically with Izuna right in front of him. 

The Kyuubi grumbles at her. It is so angry, so, _so_ angry, but Mito can’t bring herself to care – all of her precious people are safe and home if not sane, and that’s good enough for her. Hashirama doesn't come home that night - she can still sense him out in the forest, singlehandedly rejuvenating the huge swathes of plant life the bijuu had destroyed - but at least he's being constructive with his frustration. He's got quite the temper despite his silliness and it's good that he's learning how to control it.

After a long, hot shower, Mito collapses with Kyashi into their too-big bed and they fall asleep like that, cocooned in each other and the unwavering love they share and also an obscene amount of blankets. Every time she focuses on her positive emotions, the Kyuubi seems to be weakened; by the time she's sleeping it's almost powerless, and she's satisfied in knowing that she can protect herself and her dear ones.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i mean im just real proud of the whole water dragon no jutsu. tobirama saves madara's fuckngin life with the soulmark jutsu??? Poetic.
> 
> kurama's speech quirk is all small caps but that doesnt translate to ao3 so its just all lowercase with punctuation. its a little bit confusing but matatabi's speech quirk is all lowercase w no punctuation only commas + ending sentences so hopefully that helps
> 
> i want to make a hehe funney joke but i cant think of any. lets see if there are more later
> 
> from now on tobi + madara are like fucking grossly stupidly in love its nasty. theyre goopy and they even scare away hashirama with the Goopiness thats just how it be sometimes !
> 
> the byakugou works so much better than the tartarus seal because lmao it is. funnily enough something kyashi + mito, two excellent sealing masters who are also gfs, work on together with the cumulative experience of one whole jinchuuriki under their belts already is a lot more stable and effective than the edgy stupid tattoo kyashi gave her friend while they were lowkey dying
> 
> listen im probably not going to bc im terrified of mary sues but i want to give kyashi the eight tails so fucking badly. i want to i want 2 make it happen and so far ive had self control.......so far ive been good.....but i am just so weak and gay................
> 
> madara tries 2 sneak in to tobirama's room romeo + juliet style and touka punches him so hard in the crotch he has to see a medic to make sure his dick doesn't stay inverted


	16. i am the sickness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Matatabi has emotions, much to her disgust. Madara and Hashirama have a talk, and there is a good deal of introspection.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> let me tell yall im so fucking pleased that this is ending on a clean 200 pages in the word doc i mean thats some Goode Shit Right There Hell Yea Babey
> 
> this chapter is a whole hell of a lot shorter than most of the others - only like 3K or so - and there are a lot of threads left unpoked, but there's gonna be a sequel where i promise we'll get resolution and courting and marriage and zetsu fucking dies and shit. i think im gonna name it after apex predator (mean girls) cause thats just how it be when your name is matatabi
> 
> this chapter as a whole is really goopy and emotional but i think its time we had some goopy emotions that werent completely sad and tragic
> 
> i would have made it longer but i like it as it is and i dont want to stretch it out too much bc that is a definite weakness of mine i think and i like the ending....i think its cute and again its not the end the end, just the end of this fic. there will be another installment and ill die before i give up on this folks thats just Facts
> 
> now that i have more than one published work in this series it feels a lot more solid and serious so theres also that

ON THE ROAD, HI NO KUNI, PRE-FOUNDERS’ ERA

ABOUT A WEEK AGO

 

Tobirama doesn’t know what, exactly, happens when Matatabi dips into the bijuu plane, but when she emerges, she is – _different_ , somehow. The nauseating clash of hot and cold has settled down into a pleasant mix of warm and cool, and her chakra is almost entirely freely connected to his, despite him not having requested it or talked to her about it. 

The bounty hunter is still dragging him along like so much luggage, so Tobirama doesn’t feel guilty about plunging backwards into the Tartarus Seal so he can ask Matatabi what, exactly, the fuck is going on. 

When he opens his eyes, she is _free._

Well, not free – there’s still a chain attached to her collar and anchored in the massive parasite tree, but the restraints wrapped around her body and the stakes driven through her paws are gone altogether.

The island is different, too; there’s lush green grass and cool, spongy moss covering the bare earth, and from beneath the tree’s roots a spring bubbles up, forming a small but fairly deep pool that runs off the side into the dark infinity of the seal-space. 

When he approaches, she lets him get closer than she ever has before, and when he reaches out to lay one of his hands on her massive face, her eyes do not open. She doesn’t even twitch.

If it weren’t for the pulses of chakra Tobirama can feel coursing through him, he’d almost think she was _dead._

[…Matatabi? Did something happen?] 

[ **…** ]

[Matatabi. What’s – what’s the issue? Could you tell me? There’s not really much else to do, here.] 

[ **………** ] 

[Oh, alright, you don’t want to talk. That’s okay. I’ll just sit here, by the pond.] 

[ **…………** ]

[The water’s very nice. It feels good.]

They sit like that for what could be hours. Tobirama chats inanely at her about anything and everything that comes to his mind, talking more than he has for as long as he can remember, and Matatabi is silent, every line of her body taut and still.

When she finally speaks, he’s shocked; he’d nearly forgotten she was there and had just been humming idly to himself.

[ **your litter. the girls and hashirama and tōka. they are warm and intimate and _caring_** **in a way i have _never_ known between my own siblings. ……the bijuu have an antagonistic coexistence and we only really interact when were forced to. i havent told you, but a long time ago, eleven years now, my sibling kokuo was almost stolen and captured by the humans. they only survived to run free another day because son goku arrived in time to save them.**]

[ **weve never spoken about it. none of us. kokuo hasnt appeared on the bijuu plane since that day and it hasnt fucking mattered because we never talk to them. they could be dead for all i know and no one would care. not one of us.** ]

[ **a very long time ago, an old man named hagoromo took aside me and mine and explained to us that we are family, that we should know each other and look out for each other and _care_ because no one else would. _care_ because thats the one guarantee we were supposed to have in this world.**]

[ **were technically family, but…were _not_ a family, not by the standards that you and yours follow. relation seems to have nothing to do with it. you consider the bonded kunoichi pair you sisters although the three of you share no blood. you refuse to acknowledge butsuma as your kin, which is… _fair_ , all things considered. tōka is dear to you more than your status as cousins could ever truly encompass.**] 

[ **it was frustrating when i couldn’t access our plane just because i was used to being able to do so, just because i was tired of humanity and wanted to escape. not because i _wanted_ to talk to isobu or saiken or chomei. not because i _missed_ them – just because i missed the place where we all sometimes gather. It was endlessly frustrating, being blocked from accessing anything beyond my seal or my human.**]

[ **maybe it was a little more frustrating because i _don’t have_ a true heart family. maybe its because im not peanut and her siblings. i cant wrestle and heal in the presence of my precious people because _i dont have any._ maybe its because kurama, the eldest, _my_ clan head, the leader of our little group – he has _never_ called me little sister and he doesn’t even really use my _name._ your** **head is so _full_ of hashirama-memories, countless examples of the boundless, all-consuming love your anija holds for you.**]

[ **countless instances of that human recklessness, that soul-deep mindless urge that exists within the mortals to protect and defend and care for their loved ones. somehow you forget it sometimes but oh you are _so_ dearly loved. not by many maybe but your brother has more than enough heart for five people and is never unwilling to share. human-madara too you know – he doesn’t know you as his tobirama-mate, but the overwhelming blinding love he has for his tobirama-mate nonetheless – for a person he _does not know_ for a faceless enemy he thinks he hates…it is very very obvious even to me and i barely receive the secondhand imprints of the Bond sensations.**]

[ **maybe it was sitting here inside my seal when you laid awake long hours into the night plagued by loneliness. sometimes its so strong that i have to wonder that you dont just _break_ under the weight of your own emotions. you miss your human-family hashirama in particular like you would miss an amputated limb.**]

[ **how do you – how do you _do_ this, human?**]

Matatabi’s voice is raw and _pained_ and before he knows it, Tobirama is up and walking over to her, wrapping his arms as far as he can around her giant muzzle and resting his head against her sloping nose. The ugly emotions choking her wrinkle her nose and make her gnash her teeth, but he just hangs on. Typically, he doesn’t like physical contact, but something about this is soothing, comforting where it should itch and burn.

[ **see – see! you just _do that_ , you just _hug me._ you _hate_ hugs and – and – and you just _touch_ me like im not a monster with no family and no one to love-**]

[Shut up, witch,] Tobirama whispers, unsure if she can hear him. [Maybe not, but you can borrow mine if you want to. I’m sure Anija at least would be _thrilled_ to have a new sister.]

That night is a pretty bad one, but it’s still important.

It’s the first time he really feels _close_ to Matatabi, and when he settles down to sleep as Kakuzu sets up camp, he shoves his family-love-bonding feeling down through the sealing connection, and from the echo of warmth he receives in response, he’s pretty confident she got the message.

That week passes in solemn silence, with Matatabi brooding inside the seal and Tobirama just _exhausted_.

When the Kyuubi – _Kurama_ , Matatabi’s cranky not-anija – attacks them, there isn’t a single moment of hesitation that slows the two of them down before her chakra floods through him like a crashing waterfall. Before he knows it, he’s going up, up, _up,_ growing claws and fangs and paws and tails and blue-black fiery fur. 

Your move, ‘nija, thinks Tobirama, snarling using the mouth of the Two-Tails and leaping up in perfect sync with Matatabi to hurl a bijūdama right into the Nine-Tails’s cruel, toothy face.

 

TŌKA’S HOUSE, HI NO KUNI, FOUNDERS’ ERA

ONE DAY AFTER THE END OF THE BATTLE

 

Madara feels like a goddamn _child._ Standing in front of Tobirama’s – his _soulmate!_ Holy _shit_ Senju Tobirama is his _soulmate!_ \- cousin’s door, shuffling his sandals in the dust, trying not to look like a desperate weirdo and failing miserably if the Looks he’s getting from several Senju children are any indication. 

He’s been here for hours already. Tōka said that she can’t let him in yet, whatever the hell _that_ means, and had promised to _defile_ Izuna if he tried to sneak in, so he’s just…standing. And waiting. And trying not to let the sharp swell of anxiety in his chest overwhelm him – he is _Uchiha Madara,_ damn it, he will not be overcome by – by _feelings!_

He is Uchiha Madara, and if he has to wait like this any longer, he may very well be overcome by feelings.

Tobirama is unconscious and has been for over a day now. Madara forces himself not to worry – transforming into the Two-Tails was likely very taxing, and he’s very much still alive, just – numb.

After eleven goddamn years Madara _finally_ has his soulmate within his grasp and he’s sleeping and hidden away and his Mark is numb and everything is torturous and _horrible._

If his life was some kind of romantically inclined piece of literature _which it is not,_ he has to wonder about what kind of cruel god would treat him like this, leave him hanging after so long.

He’s so out of it that he doesn’t notice the presence of Hashirama and two of the Senju elders until they’re right up on the doorstep with him, and it takes a good deal of self-control to keep from whipping around and shrieking in surprise. These aren’t Uchiha, Madara forcibly reminds himself, they won’t be used to his flailing and screaming.

He draws himself up to his full height and does his best to glare menacingly down at the two old men – Hashirama seems to be doing that as well, so he feels no guilt in snarling rudely at the intruders.

“Uchiha-sama,” the one on the right says, grave and grim and so _boldly_ assuming Madara will bother to listen to anything he has to say, “please step aside. Yakuma-san and I must have _words_ with the Nibi jinchuuriki. This is a Senju matter and a Senju matter alone, pardon my candor.”

“A Senju matter – I most certainly do _not!_ Tobirama is a Senju, but more importantly he is _my_ soulmate, not anyone else’s soulmate, so you don’t get to do _anything_ to him unless I say you can, especially since he’s unconscious.”

Hashirama actually looks a little pained at that, as if he can’t decide whether to try and strangle Madara again for being Bonded to his little brother or clap him on the shoulder for protected said little brother from a pair of wrinkled old bags.

“Tobirama,” snaps Yakuma coldly, “is _not_ a Senju, and that is the matter that must be discussed. As you, Uchiha-sama, are not a Senju either, we _graciously_ invite you to wait _outside_ the compound while discussions take place. Perhaps you may even have custody of him once we’re done, hmm, yes? Now step _aside._ ”

Madara almost blows a Grand Fireball right in his horrible lying _face,_ but Hashirama beats him to the punch by letting loose enough killing intent to make even him a little queasy. His face is unnaturally cold and hard, and there’s a vindictive rage that bubbles up in Madara’s stomach upon seeing it. He was _right_ to refuse – these old fuckers don’t even deserve to speak Tobirama’s name, and they’ll do well to keep it out of their mouths. 

“Yakuma-san, Satoshi-san,” Hashirama actually _snarls,_ and the sound coming from him is the single most terrifying thing Madara has ever heard, “Tobira _saved Fire Country._ He killed our father, but he has kept the Nine-Tails from killing all the rest of us, and that should be _more_ than enough to earn him acceptance back into the Clan. _I’m_ the Head now, and I can make these decisions, and I say he _stays._ ”

“Hashirama-sama, we have _agreed_ to your _peace._ We will deign to allow the _Uchiha Clan Head_ to fraternize with an individual who was once one of our own. We have consented to the ridiculous scheme that led to the Kyuubi being sealed within a foreign woman. We _know_ that you want a village, and we also know that there are only so many times you can rock the boat. Making your little brother a Senju once more is insult to injury, my lord, and it will lose you the support of the council. Please do inform the Two-Tails’s jinchuuriki of this when you next speak.”

The pair of elders sweep off away into the Senju compound, paying no mind to the killing intent Hashirama radiates or the shock warping Madara’s face into a comical fishy gape. 

Tōka’s door is _still shut,_ and Tobirama hasn’t yet awakened, so when Hashirama drags him away into the forest, Madara doesn’t protest too much.

It takes them a good half hour to reach that spot by the Nakano where they’d first met so long ago; Madara’s Sharingan supplies him with phantom memories of this place. Hashirama, crying softly with a scraped knee and a shattered heart; Juuno, shoving Azuki into the river for lighting her hair on fire; himself, skipping a stone to the opposite shore for the first time and learning how to water-walk with Hashirama by his side.

The sun is setting as they sit down on the riverbank, an echo of the pictures they’d made in the years past, both of them grown men now, Clan Heads and legendary shinobi. Hashirama’s hair has grown out of that awful bowl-cut and now brushes at his lower back, and Madara’s own mane is slowly eating him alive, starting with the upper half of his body. He’s big enough to properly wield the Gunbai Uchiwa, now, tall and strong enough to bear the prized hereditary weapon of his Clan and fight with it in their defense.

He’s strong enough now to make sure they’ll never have to fight again, if he can help it. 

“Tell me, old friend,” Hashirama says softly, handling a round, flat stone and staring at the glassy surface of the water and the spectrum of warm colors it reflects. “What – what do you _really_ think of Tobirama? As a person, Madara, not just as your soulmate. I know how the Uchiha are, but you’ve _hated_ him since before you even knew him. I know it – he’s been coping with a painful Mark since it came in eleven years ago, even though he would never let me see it. Are you willing to know him, to love _him,_ as Tobirama and not just your Bonded partner?”

It’s a question Madara has been asking himself since he found out that truth hours ago, and he still has no answer.

“…”

“Would you _try?_ Tobira is cranky and contrary and cold more often than not. He doesn’t really understand social cues the way a genius probably should, and he analyzes everything, and I mean _everything._ He’s probably picked apart your Bond a hundred thousand times by now. He’s awkward and sometimes he’s cruel and he’s utterly _obsessed_ with his jutsus and the rules. He’s – he’s very hard to love sometimes, and his love looks different than most other people’s. It’s not so obvious and it scares a lot of folks away, because his kind of affection is quieter and softer and requires more attention to notice. Would you take that? Would you love him _because_ of those things and not in spite of them? I’m not asking if you already _do,_ Madara, you hardly know him, just…would you?”

“I would. All I knew of him was what Izuna told me – that he’s a cruel, callous bastard who doesn’t hate the Uchiha only because he has no feelings at all, that he’s a robot who doesn’t sleep and lives only for battle. I also know that’s not true, since I’ve been receiving his emotions on and off for over a decade. I don’t love him, I think, not right now – I can hardly process the idea that he’s my fucking _soulmate,_ Hashirama, so wipe that look off your face, I’m hardly about to deflower him on the spot. I _don’t_ love him, but…”

Madara thinks of the distant, addicting embrace of seawater-moonrise-ozone, thinks of the way Hashirama’s little brother somehow tamed a _bijuu,_ thinks of the way Izuna’s always had a fiercely dedicated rival to inspire him to train and become strong and stay _alive._

He thinks of the glow of the Two-Tails’s chakra, of the lovely snarl that had contorted Tobirama’s flawless face when he thought Madara was in danger.

He thinks of the way Tōka and Hashirama and Mito and Kyashi are all so rabidly overprotective of this one person, this one unremarkable person, perceived to be so cold and uncaring and impersonal even within his own clan. There must be _something_ there to draw their attention. There has to be _something_ making Senju Tobirama such an exceptional individual, and with peace on the horizon and the village in the works, Madara has all of the time in the world to figure out what, exactly, that thing is, and to come to treasure it, just as he has no doubt he’ll come to treasure the person. 

“…I really think I could.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -fin-
> 
> aaaaaand thats IT folks we made it!!!!! thamk you all for continuing to put up w my bullshit....i love u for it!!
> 
> i dont actually have anything funney to say right now cause im HUGE depressed but im just gonna pretend i have a good joke and then ill insert it later if i make one up

**Author's Note:**

> i was drafting this and just. hit in the face w a brick witth the sheer power of gay love. like im not an mlm but god just like even thinking abt how tragic and forbidden being sga is even without the whole knockoff romeo/juliet shtick going on..........gay people really did invent love huh. technically its a soulmate au but 100% all of my descriptions of feelings are fantasized versions of how i feel when i text my gf.....lots of heart n soul and lgbt in this, like how it Should be
> 
> thamk you for reading my indulgent impulse fanfic and let me know if you liked it or hated it or have just noticed typos where i haven't xoxo


End file.
